A NORTH West Euro MP is calling for safer injection needles to prevent hospital accidents.

The move is a bid to cut the number of potentially fatal accidents that occur with used needles in hospitals.

Labour Euro MP Arlene McCarthy and colleagues will present a report to the European Parliament this week demanding that new, safe needles are made compulsory across Europe.

According to the Royal College of Nursing, 100,000 incidents occur in the UK every year where doctors, nurses or ancillary staff, are accidentally stabbed with a needle infected with patients' blood as they replace the needle cap.

Labour Euro MPs have already secured the European Commission's agreement to amend existing health and safety legislation to make a new needle with a protective shield the only one that can be used in European hospitals and surgeries. Speaking from Brussels, Ms McCarthy said: "There is a shortage of healthcare staff in the UK. One of the reasons why the care profession is unattractive is because of the daily risks involved.

"Ten per cent of workers in the EU are employed in the health sector with most of them working in hospitals. But accidents in the health sector are 30 per cent above the European average according to the European Commission.

"Injuries with needles can lead to the transmission of more than 20 life-threatening viruses, including hepatitis B, hepatitis C, and HIV or AIDS.

"Current European health and safety legislation has not managed to prevent these accidents. We need a revision of the law that gives health staff new safer needles to use and better training for use of potentially dangerous equipment."

Labour Euro MPs are also calling for common EU standards on reporting and recording needle injuries.