Some 1,700 hospital patients die and 30,000 are injured every year because of mistakes by hospital staff, according to a report by the medical specialists association.

The report, based on 2004 figures, was produced using 8,000 medical records from 21 hospitals.
Some 1.3 million people are admitted to hospital every year and around 3% of these die, the report said.
Mistakes by specialists are the main reason for the unexpected deaths, with technical problems another main cause. ‘Every avoidable death is one too many,’ a spokesman for the association said.