DAFTEST report of the week comes from the Royal Derby Hospital which claims to be haunted by a cloaked figure roaming the wards and corridors.
Could the apparition be a nurse in a burqa?
According to this report, senior manager Debbie Butler sent an email to staff, informing them of a plan to bring in a priest to rid the hospital of paranormal activity.
She wrote:
I’m not sure how many of you are aware that some members of staff have reported seeing a ghost. I’m taking it seriously as it is affecting some members of staff and the last thing I want is staff feeling uneasy at work.
I don’t want to scare anyone any more than necessary, but felt it was best I made you all aware of the situation and what we are doing about it. I’ve spoken to the Trust’s chaplain and she is going to arrange for someone from the cathedral to exorcise the department.
The £334 million hospital is located on the site of the old Derby City General Hospital, which was built in the 1920s over part of a Roman road.
Ms Butler added:
I understand that some of you will probably be worried or scared about this. If any of you wish to discuss this, feel free to contact me at any time.
Anglican priests usually need to seek permission from a bishop before performing an exorcism. A spokesman for the Bishop of Derby said:
Any case such as this is put to the Bishop. He would seek proper advice before taking action.
A spokeswoman for Derby Hospitals NHS Trust added:
We take information from staff seriously and are working with the hospital chaplaincy to put people’s minds at ease.
Two amusing comments -the second simply barking -were posted under the report.
The first said:
Utter tripe!!!!! I cannot believe the NHS has had to pay for this sort of nonsense. There are no such things as ghosts and this story is just pandering to hysterical people who need a good dose of reality. When you consider that hospitals, by their very nature, are the scenes of mass numbers of people dying – often traumatically – then by extension every hospital should be full of ghosts.
Commenter No 2 said:
Asking a priest to move a spirit on, is like asking a plumber to fix a nuclear plant. Religeon (sic) has hidden the truth regarding life after death for hundreds of years. The correct approach should be an investigation to determine if the apprarition (sic) is a human soul who has not moved on, or a replay of events that have occured at the site.
Remind me, what year is this?
The Freethinker was founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion. After the publication of 
January 30th, 2009 at 10:30 am
The second commenter could have perhaps inserted a nice double-meaning by misspelling it reLIEgion.
As for the burqua, i wouldn’t be surprised. I bet by the time i’m in my 70′s or 80′s and needing a bone marrow transplant, i’ll have just had it all killed off, so i’ll have no immune system, and in will trot one of them wearing the same mobile tent she’s just been walking past all the coughing and sneezing patients with.
January 30th, 2009 at 11:06 am
Could this be a Surgical Spirit?
January 30th, 2009 at 11:18 am
Very good Kev.
Maybe he was in there with ooooooping cough?
January 30th, 2009 at 11:31 am
Maybe even in for a quick eye test so he can get some new ‘spectrecals’? Sorry, the medication is wearing off!!!
January 30th, 2009 at 11:39 am
Could it a decoffinated patient in search of compensation for a gallbladder op gone horribly wrong?
January 30th, 2009 at 11:45 am
Granny!!! Put some clothes on and get back in your bed!
January 30th, 2009 at 11:58 am
Just passing through most likely nothing to worry about.
January 30th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
Perhaps the ghost is that mysterious Mrs A we’re always hearing about in hospitals!
January 30th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
No surprise. The NHS waste millions of pounds on hospital chaplains and so called prayer rooms – which are usually hijacked by the muzzies to the exclusion of other brands of religious nutters. Just think how many extra Doctors or nurses could be employed if the NHS stopped pandering to religion. Hospitals are for curing the sick, sadly, they can’t seem to cure god disease.
January 31st, 2009 at 4:03 pm
I first heard of this – go on,guess ——- on good old “must be objective and not publicise aid requests for maimed Palastinian kids without as much as an aspirin” BBC. There was some posh senior clerical twat with a voice to match telling a supposed factual reporter that this haunting was entirely possible. Indeed, says this nutter, the spirit (for a moment I thought we were getting somwhere) could be that of a restless Roman Legionaire who was doing a HeathRow Protest because the Ministry of Transport had driven a road and added insult to injury by building a hospital over his holiday bungalow.
Now then, I thought objects went through these ghosts. Why did they wait so long to protest? And why wasn’t this clergy type locked up for a spell of treatment? Perhaps the worst aspect of this is that the BBC interviews ghost experts without as much as a sceptical challenge – and not on TFTD.
January 31st, 2009 at 4:45 pm
As Barry says, an Anglican priest has to get permission from a Bishop to perform an exorcism, but it’s not well known (even amongst Anglicans) that each diocese appoints a cleric with responsibility for spiritual healing, including training in exorcism. I know this from a nice enough ‘old school’ vicar in my area who took on the role – ironically he quickly got a debilitating illness and has been unable to work since!
The more responsible bit of the job is to combat obvious religious charlatans who demand money, the dubious bit is to look at developing stuff like ‘healing services’ – which to secular eyes would be exactly what spiritualists and faith healers do, but a bit more upmarket and carefully avoiding claims to ‘cure’ anything outright by cloaking it in psychobabble.
Religion really is a business and these days the big denominations really do think that way, and as the old favourites fall away they’re busily inventing new ‘niche markets’.