A NEW dedicated ‘pandemic centre' could be built in the city, plans have revealed.

The purpose-built clinic would be built on the car park of Barbourne Medical Centre in Worcester and would treat patients with, or suspected of having, coronavirus.

The need for a new Covid hub follows a decision by GPs at Farrier House Surgery to stop being the city’s Covid ‘red’ clinic.

Worcester City Primary Care Network (WCPN), which is made up of several of the city’s GP surgeries, has used Farrier House Surgery in Farrier Street as the Covid ‘red’ clinic to treat people with, or suspected of having, coronavirus since March.

The decision means Farrier House Surgery will no longer be treating coronavirus patients by the end of the year.

WCPN said it will be temporarily using other buildings over the winter but will need a permanent building next year and has backed the plans by Barbourne Medical Centre.

The plans show separate waiting areas for patients with Covid and another for suspected patients with treatment rooms leading to dedicated exits to stop people from meeting.

A statement included with the planning application said: “With the proposed Covid clinic the car parking reduces by eight spaces to 33 spaces in total.

“It is the intent of Worcester Primary Care Network to continue with teleconsulting for the foreseeable future with GPs reducing the number of face-to-face consultations. It is hoped that individual consultations will return however the new ‘normal’ is teleconsultations.

“Face-to-face consultations, it is predicted, will still carry on but they will not return to the pre-Covid levels.

“At present we are in the midst of a ‘second wave’ of the coronavirus pandemic and until a vaccine is produced in sufficient quantities it is anticipated that the pandemic will be with us for years to come.”

The doctor’s surgery, which opened in 2012, currently has more than 10,000 patients.

Since the outbreak of the pandemic, most consultations have been held either over the phone or via a computer with prescriptions sent directly to pharmacies and, according to the surgery, the number of people visiting the centre has dropped by almost 500 per cent compared to the same time last year.

Between April and August, around 30 patients were seen a day at the surgery compared to 188 a day during the same six-month period last year.

The surgery has said it would be able to lose a handful of car parking spaces to make way for the Covid clinic due to the huge drop in visitors during the pandemic as well as the move towards holding most appointments over the phone.

The surgery added that, once the pandemic is over, the building will be used for out-of-hours and weekend treatments, district nursing and health visiting.