East Lancashire hospitals are continuing to allow visitors despite other trusts closing their doors.

The trust, which runs Royal Blackburn Hospital and Burnley General Hospital is still allowing visitors to patients.

Elsewhere in the county, Lancashire Teaching Hospitals which operates Royal Preston Hospital and Chorley and South Ribble Hospital, and University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay, which operates Royal Lancaster Infirmary and Queen Victoria Hospital in Morecambe, both decided to close to visitors on December 31.

Both of the trusts said that they have banned visiting due to the increasing number of Covid-19 cases due to the fast spreading Omicron variant.

In both trusts, exemptions the the visitors policy will be made for patients receiving end of life care and for one person to provide carers support to patients with additional needs.

This comes as over a quarter of NHS staff absences in East Lancashire Hospitals Trust are as a result of Covid-19.

NHS England data shows 731 staff at East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust were off sick on December 26 – the latest date for which data is available.

Of the 731 staff off work, 206, 28 per cent, were off because they had Covid-19, or were self-isolating due to the virus.

This was a 69 per cent increase on a week before, when 122 Covid-related absences were recorded.