A PETITION has been launched in a bid to save Burnham-on-Sea Minor Injuries Unit (MIU) after it was announced it could be at risk of closure.

More than 1,300 people have now signed the petition, 'Keep urgent and minor injury treatment in Burnham-on-Sea', which gained more than 1,000 just 24 hours after it was launched online on Saturday (February 22).

The Friends of Burnham-on-Sea War Memorial Hospital, who organised the appeal, are urging all those to value to 24-hour service to sign it at chng.it/xf4QjY5ngL

It comes after Somerset Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) announced earlier this month that the town's MIU is one of seven units across the county which could be closed down and replaced with urgent treatment centres.

Bernard Spilsbury, chairman of The Friends of Burnham War Memorial Hospital, said the group was inspired to start the petition after attending 'Fit for my Future' engagement meeting on February 18.

"To the best of my knowledge this was the first meeting to be held in the Burnham area and to say the least I was embarrassed at the lack of organisation," Bernard said.

"It was almost as if they thought that just a handful of people to turn up. Save to say the numbers proved to be far more than was obviously expected and it was left to hospital staff to quickly facilitate another and larger space for one of the meetings.

"Feelings at the meeting that I attended ran high and the speakers were left in no doubt that people are passionate about our hospital.

"There was a request that the organisers arrange a public meeting in a venue such as The Princess Theatre and also to get young families involved by doing something similar in The King Alfred School Academy.

"As a result of what we discovered The Friends made the decision to raise the awareness of Burnham residents of what could happen.

"A quote within the CCG's literature made it very clear that our MIU could and most likely, will, as it stands at the moment, be closed in the future.

"We have organised a petition so that we can find out the strength of feeling amongst the residents, businesses especially the holiday camp owners whose visitors often use the present MIU,"

Bernard said he emailed Somerset CCG on behalf of The Friends to see if they could be involved to ensure that the MIU does not close but he has not yet received a response.

He said he thinks more awareness needs to be raised on how these proposals could affect not only residents but 20,000 holidaymakers who come to Burnham each year.

A spokesperson for Fit for My Future said: “We were delighted to be at Burnham on Sea Community Hospital to share information about our engagement on community health and care services and listen to what people had to say.

"We heard from around 70 people. We’d like to reassure everyone that this is engagement, not consultation. No decisions have been made and we do not have any preferred options in terms of how services will be provided in the future.

“We are sharing our early thinking about how health and care services in Somerset can work better together and better meet the needs of our population. We have a real opportunity to design a new way of providing care that supports people to live independent, healthier lives. We are also sharing the reasons why our current services need to change and the challenges that we face in continuing to run them in the way they currently are.

“We want people to help us shape and improve our future services. This is why we are talking to people about our opportunities and challenges and listening to their views.

“We received good feedback from patients, staff and the public who attended the listening event at Burnham on Sea Community Hospital. All comments and feedback will be logged as part of our engagement programme and be independently analysed by Participate Ltd. Their independent report will be published later this year so everyone can read it.

“We will be back in Burnham on Sea, at the library on Tuesday 24 March between 3pm and 5pm, to listen to your views.

“People can find out more about our early thinking around improvements to community health and care services on our website at https://www.fitformyfuture.org.uk/community-services/ and give their feedback via our survey at http://bit.ly/FFMF-community-health-and-care-spring-2020. Hard copies of our engagement summary and survey are available at the hospital and at the library.”