IT is a start: no more. News that MRSA infections in hospitals have fallen to the lowest recorded level deserves a muted cheer at best.

Records only began four years ago and the fall-off in cases is small. While it is encouraging that the relentless rise in cases has been checked, Health Secretary John Reid has no reason to celebrate.

Thousands of people are still falling victim to MRSA. These are patients who went into hospital rightly expecting to come out feeling better.

Instead, their health was hit for six by bacteria picked up in the place you would least expect to be cleaner than clean: the ward.

Scandalously, around 5,000 people die every year from bugs contracted in hospital, including about 1,000 from MRSA.

Mr Reid says the reduction in infections is a triumph for his measures to fight the superbug: in-hospital campaigns to promote hand washing, new equipment cleaning techniques and the return of the matron.

But these basic measures should have been in place long ago. Their belated introduction has allowed MRSA to thrive in our health service while being kept under control in European hospitals.

A survey last month found patients believed English hospitals were getting dirtier. News that Bootham Park Hospital has a problem with rats is hardly reassuring.

It will take a lot more than one drop in infection reduction rates to convince the public that ministers have got this crisis under control.

Updated: 09:32 Monday, March 07, 2005