hot water bottles & fans

“A new, low-carbon combined cooling, heating and power solution has been created for St Bartholomew’s Hospital in London as part of the first fully-financed PFI deal of its kind.

Delivered by Skanska, the project is part of Sustainable Development Capital‘s (SDCL) Powering Health collaboration with GE, Clarke Energy and the NHS Confederation.

Under the deal SDCL has provided finance for Skanska to deliver a low-carbon combined chilling/heating and power (CCHP) solution at the hospital. The £2.5m investment will be made by the UK Energy Efficiency Investments Fund, which has launched a £50m fund supported by the Green Investment Bank.”

Sounds great. I have been a patient at Barts hospital for a month and was a patient here in February, and neither the heating nor the air-conditioning have worked. My bed faces the west and on sunny days gets very hot. And it's autumn. A nurse told me that during the long hot summer this year the temperature on south and west-facing sides was 'unbearable' for both patients and staff. In winter, she said, it was so cold at night, they were handing out 4/5 blankets to each patient.

How can a medical institution of such excellence, with such a dedicated staff, all of whom I now admire and adore, mess things up when it comes to the simple problems of temperature and nutrition?

Answers from Skanska and Serco please. I am ill and cannot continue this struggle. Maybe others can.

Meanwhile these two photos show my solution for this hospital over the coming years.

I'm afraid I feel very depressed about all this right now so here is another Leonard Cohen to help you join me.