Gosport hospital deaths: Police start new search

Dr Jane Barton was found guilty of serious professional misconduct in 2010 but no prosecutions were brought

Police investigating the deaths of hospital patients who were given "dangerous" levels of painkillers have carried out a new search at the site.

Officers examined Gosport War Memorial Hospital in Hampshire on Sunday.

No details have been given of the search, which is part of a new criminal investigation by Kent and Essex Police.

An inquiry found 456 patients died after being given opiate drugs at the hospital between 1987 and 2001, but no charges have ever been brought.

The new inquiry, Operation Magenta, was launched in April 2019, following three previous investigations by Hampshire Constabulary.

Assistant Chief Constable Nick Downing, who has since left the inquiry, said at the launch he believed there was "new and different material" in the case.

He said a medical panel would be set up to "prove or disprove the causational link between opioids being administered and deaths".

The weekend search was part of efforts to find any new relevant evidence, detectives told patients' relatives.

Police are due to update relatives in February on progress in the investigation.

Relatives tried to raise concerns about the administration of medication on the hospital wards

The Gosport Independent Review Panel report, published in June 2018, found there was a "disregard for human life" at the hospital.

It also found an "institutionalised regime" of prescribing and administering amounts of opiate medication that were not clinically justified.

The report said whistleblowers and families were ignored as they attempted to raise concerns about the administration of medication, which was overseen by Dr Jane Barton.

Dr Barton retired after being found guilty by a medical panel of failings in her care of 12 patients at Gosport between 1996 and 1999.

In a statement in 2018, Dr Barton said she was a "hard-working doctor" who was "doing her best" for patients in a "very inadequately resourced" part of the NHS.