MORE THAN 200 furious pensioners, young mothers and other residents threw angry questions at a hospital trust planning to close their hospital at a public meeting.

Managers from Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust braved the session in Wantage on Thursday night to discuss their plans to shut the town's community hospital.

The trust is planning to close the facility over the coming months after legionella bacteria were detected in the water system.

But health bosses also said they would not re-open the facility until after a public consultation starting this autumn into the future of all health care it provides in Oxfordshire.

Residents who fear this could mean a permanent closure of the hospital "by the back door" repeatedly asked the trust representatives why they could not keep the hospital open, keeping the bacteria at bay using tried-and-tested techniques, until after the consultation.

Older people's service director Anne Brierley said the trust wanted to "proactively" close the hospital while the bacteria were still at bay, rather than wait until it reached dangerous levels and have to evacuate patients in an emergency protocol.

Grove Parish Council chairman June Stock said: "To me this just feels like you are continuing the role of closing down everything that has been at Wantage hospital.

"When I first started on this council there was an A&E department and 24 beds... if this reopens we want all of this back."