CAMPAIGNERS have vowed to keep fighting for the reopening of a community hospital in a Cornish town.

A public meeting in Fowey saw 130 people turn up to show their support for their town’s hospital being put back into service after several years of closure.

The campaign is being run as the authorities seek to make the temporary closure permanent.

Residents Andy and Jacky Keep and Rob Rooney have come together to campaign for the reopening.

They said: “Fowey Hospital was provided for the people of Fowey, Polruan, Tywardreath and Golant to meet health needs. People pressure can reopen it as a (for instance) rehab centre, helping to relieve the pressure on Treliske Hospital in Truro.

“Faceless, unaccountable bureaucrats think they have it all sewn up. They sent their PR professionals on December 7 to tell us: ‘The hospital is no longer able to provide health and care.’

“We don’t agree. One hundred and thirty people turned up at the public meeting we organised at the community centre at Squires Field. The meeting agreed to campaign to have Fowey Hospital reopened as an NHS facility for local need.

“The meeting further agreed that the consultation Cornwall Council’s health and adult social care committee was being asked to approve was flawed and skewed to arrive at a pre-conceived outcome.

“A new consultation should be commissioned, using independent practitioners.

“The meeting was an indicator of the strength of feeling in Fowey and district about Fowey Hospital and the Cornwall & Isles of Scilly Integrated Care Board (ICB) should reconsider its planned course of action.

“A total, so far, of 564 people have signed a petition which reads: ‘We, the undersigned, demand that Fowey Hospital is reopened as a fully-staffed, fully resourced NHS facility serving local need.’”

The campaigners had also lobbied councillors before the meeting of Cornwall Council’s health and adult social care committee which discussed the future of the hospital which was closed in 2016.

The committee heard that the 111-year-old hospital is no longer fit for purpose and is unlikely to be viable as a care setting in the future as it’s too small.

The committee agreed to recommendations from the ICB that the minor injury service and inpatient beds should remain permanently closed at the site.

The committee was told that significant investment would be needed to bring the hospital up to the standard needed for modern care and that it could only provide six beds which is now considered too small a number.

Cornwall councillor Andy Virr, who represents Fowey, said: “It’s not an easy thing for a politician to support the closure of a hospital, but I think it is the right step forward. That’s not just my view, it was the view of the working group – featuring the town council, GP surgery and other interested parties – when we looked at this five years ago.”

The ICB is due to make a final decision about the future of the hospital in May.