AS part of our campaign for a new hospital in Malvern, Ralph Madden, chairman of Malvern Town Council, and a number of councillors attended the recent meeting of the South Worcestershire Primary Care Trust.

As well as receiving the results of the consultation exercise on the hospital, the meeting discussed the basis of its three-year plan - a mere 180 pages!

Overall, the population of the area will increase. The area already has a significant number of residents aged over 65, Malvern is already much higher than the national average.

People over 65 account for around a fifth of the population but use two-fifths of the NHS resources. The number of over 65's in the Malvern area will increase dramatically in the next few years.

When combined with the aim of reducing waiting lists, this information would indicate to me a need for more medical facilities in the area.

However, the document states that the aim is to reduce the number of emergency bed days by five per cent over the next three years.

When I asked about this, the answer given was that this is a Government target! The aim is to treat more people in the community not in acute hospitals. Such thinking has probably led to the size of the new hospital in Worcester.

The only silver lining to this cloud of centralist directives is that we should have, and will need, a very large community hospital in Malvern.

Paul TuthilL, Lower Howsell Road, Leigh Sinton.