A HOSPITAL has set up a containment ward to tackle a severe flu outbreak - the first time such a move has been needed in nine years.

York Hospital's Ward 23 only looks after patients who have contracted the virus and it is the first time health bosses have dedicated a ward to an illness since the Swine Flu pandemic in 2009.

Patients who are diagnosed with influenza are immediately taken onto the ward to try and stop further outbreaks.

Dr Damian Mawer, a consultant microbiologist and York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust's infection control doctor, told The Press: "We all had a warning that it was going to be a bad flu season with the situation in Australia, so we did plan for it and have had a good response with the staff vaccination programme.

"We also put a plan in place that we actioned and turned one of our wards into a flu ward.

"Unless patients have a very good reason not to go there, something like a heart condition, they go to Ward 23."

Dr Mawer says setting up the specific area has formed part of the hospital's positive response to the outbreak, which has seen the city record some of the highest rates of flu in the country.

However, he said he would like to see improvements made to the next flu vaccine to cut down on the number of people catching the virus.

"The ward has worked really well and we have contained the patients in one area so they get the best care," added Dr Mawer.

"We have done this once before with Swine Flu, and I'm told it hasn't had to happen again since the outbreak of that in 2009.

"There has been concern about the flu vaccine and it needs to be more effective, so let's hope that next year's is a bit better."

The hospital has also been able to crackdown on the number of people getting flu in the building after the trust invested in its own flu testing system.

The machine can test samples and deliver results the same day, instead of scientists waiting longer than 48 hours for results to come back from a laboratory in Leeds.

Dr Mawer added: "This is the thing that has made the single biggest difference and helped us be more effective.

"We have to make sure we keep this new testing machine in York.

"We were putting people we suspected of having flu into side rooms and they are a very precious resource in the NHS.

"Only the new hospitals have a lot of them and if a patient was in there with a negative result, the side room could be taken up for four days when it could have been given to someone else."

Dr Simon Padfield, consultant in communicable disease control at Public Health England Yorkshire and the Humber, said: “Flu is unpredictable and no two seasons are alike. Early indications tell us that the A(H3N2) and (H1N1)pdm viruses characterised so far are well matched to the components of the two vaccines offered to adults this flu season; the 2017/18 trivalent and quadrivalent vaccines.

"The flu B viruses that are characterised are matched to the component in the quadrivalent, but not the trivalent vaccine.

"The nasal spray vaccine, given to children who are the group most likely to be affected by flu B, protects against two B strains and will also provide indirect protection to other parts of the population."