Superbug death was 'diabolical'*

By Laura Donnelly and Jasper Copping, Sunday Telegraph
Last Updated: 11:25pm BST 31/03/2007

The widow of a man who fell victim to a superbug that has claimed 17
lives at a Norfolk hospital yesterday described his death as "diabolical".

Great-grandfather Leslie Burton-Pye, 74, was infected with Clostridium
difficile in January while visiting the James Paget Hospital in
Gorleston for a blood transfusion. He fell ill soon after and was
admitted to the hospital where he stayed until released in mid-March. He
was re-admitted last Sunday and died the next day.

Yesterday, his widow, Mavis, 67, said: "I wish I hadn't let him go in
for the transfusion. He had health problems before then but he lived
with them and was okay up to the point where he went to hospital. It is
heartbreaking." Mrs Burton-Pye, who lived with her husband in the
Norfolk Broads town of Acle, added: "He had just gone into hospital for
some blood and picked this bug up. It is absolutely diabolical that he
caught this thing on just a routine visit. I just can't believe he has
gone. It won't sink in."

She said Mr Burton-Pye's family - including five children, nine
grandchildren and two great-grandchildren - had been devastated by his
death.

Bosses at the hospital, which has been infected with the virulent "027"
strain of the superbug, admit it could take 12 weeks to get the outbreak
under control. The 17 deaths, almost all of people aged 65 and over,
have occurred since December. Sixteen more patients have been infected
but survived.

The hospital has invested an extra £400,000 to tackle the outbreak but
Wendy Slaney, the acting chief executive of the hospital, said it could
take months to bring under control.