Call for ban on mix-sex wards

Mixed-sex hospital wards humiliate and degrade patients and should be banned from the NHS within two years, the Patients' Association said yesterday.

The use of mixed-sex wards has grown dramatically over the past 10 years as part of the impetus to improve efficiency, and has led to hundreds of complaints of embarrassment, fear, assault and rape every year, it added.

Patients can choose whether they go into mixed wards but But Dr John Spiers, chairman of the association, this usually meant they had to wait even longer for a bed.