WEST SOMERSET activists were out on the streets campaigning as part of a national NHS Day of Action.

In West Somerset around 30 people turned out to protest outside Minehead Community Hospital.

Watchet Town Councillor Robin Nuttall said: "We had a good turnout at the hospital and marched to Wellington Square in the Town Centre where we distributed leaflets and petitions before heading on to Watchet.

"Everybody should be worried about, and we are seeing the effects of the cuts here in West Somerset," he said.

Both West Somerset and Bridgwater have felt the effects of a struggling NHS in recent weeks.

In Minehead ten beds at the Community Hospital closed to be temporarily moved to Williton, while six of the stroke unit beds at Williton have also recently closed, while in Bridgwater, the Community Hospital is reducing its opening times by 17.5 hours a week.

“I’ve had contact from people relating their personal experiences of how stressed the NHS is and how it affected them, and some of them are very moving” he said.

“One lady told of how when her two-year old daughter needed specialist treatment in Bristol, there was a wait of over 24 hours for an ambulance.

"This was apparently explained to her as being due to the fact that there’s only one paediatric emergency vehicle to cover the whole of the South West and South Wales. This is quite simply unacceptable”.

He said the Government was failing to fund the NHS to an adequate level.

"It is not just patients but staff as well who say more funding is needed," he said. "I worry this is the start of the privatisation of the NHS by stealth," Cllr Nuttall said.

The Somerset NHS Partnership insist that even with the bed closures they are still confident there are still enough beds to support stroke victims in West Somerset, however at a recent West Somerset Council meeting Dunster Cllr Bryan Leaker was scathing in his attack, saying the Partnership were 'interested in saving cash not lives'.