NHS plan could take high-speed broadband to rural areas

Rural areas could get next-generation broadband access courtesy of the NHS.

Eight Lancashire NHS Trusts are to be supplied with a high-speed broadband network from Virgin Media Business.

Declan Hadley at Lancashire NHS Trust told our sister publication Computing that this would allow the County Council to provide online services to areas of Lancashire that are unable to get broadband, by piggybacking on the infrastructure.

The Lancashire model could be used in other areas of the UK where it is not commercially viable to invest in the infrastructure. Until recently the Labour Government planned to implement a 50p per month tax on landlines to help pay for next-generation broadband, however this was scrapped in April.

Mr Hadley said: “We have always worked with local councils, but in these economic times everyone is looking for the best way to share services and save themselves money.”

The £9m project, which will provide a 10Gbits/sec network, will connect approximately 170 healthcare sites, including those at Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust, NHS Blackburn with Darwen, NHS East Lancashire, East Lancashire Hospitals Trust, NHS Central Lancashire, NHS North Lancashire and Lancashire Teaching Hospitals Trust.

“We could also run a Wimax service over the network to provide rural residents with high-quality wireless,” Mr Hadley said.

The Trusts have approached the Rural Development Council regarding potential access to European funding to enable them to extend the network.

Meanwhile, BT said it planned to expand the rollout of its fibre-optic network to two-thirds of the population by 2015.

The telecoms giant said this would be possible by increasing its investment in these networks by £1bn to £2.5bn.

The first four million households are expected to be connected by the end of this year, and have access to broadband services of up to 40Mbits/sec.

Ian Livingston, BT’s chief executive said the company’s programme “will make the UK one of the best connected countries in the world for next-generation broadband.”