Alcohol and A&E: should drunk people be kept out of hospital?

Fed up with the pressure placed on the NHS by drunkenness, doctors are calling for more arrests. A tour of Liverpool in the early hours of New Year’s Day reveals the chaos that over-eager revellers can cause

It’s 7pm on New Year’s Eve and the streets of Liverpool are bubbling with the anticipation of seeing out 2014 with a bang. For most people, the evening’s consequences will be no more severe than a hangover and the material for a few funny stories. But for the staff arriving at the accident and emergency department at the Royal Liverpool, the city’s main hospital, New Year’s Day wasn’t such a cheerful prospect. The hospital, based in the heart of the city, is usually the first to deal with the overindulgence of the city centre’s revellers, and paramedics waiting for callouts in the ambulance bays are apprehensive about the night ahead.

When I return at 1am on New Year’s Day, every bed is full and the bays are empty. A girl in a long black dress hitched above her knees limps through the main entrance, helped by two friends. Minutes later a young man stumbles through the gates and blearily asks where the entrance to A&E is. Blood is streaming from his nose and he is holding his left arm close to his chest. He stops to throw up before crossing the car park to the entrance and a member of staff guides him through the doors. Half an hour later an ambulance pulls into the bay and as the back doors open, the slurred and expletive-filled demands of a man on a stretcher can be heard.

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