In a speech today Tory leader Michael Howard will say that thousands of people die "needlessly" each year from hospital-acquired MRSA infections.

He will say Labour is to blame for the increase in deaths.

"Do you remember the British disease? It described Britain's economic and industrial weakness when the trade unions were out of control. The last Conservative government cured it," Howard will say.

"The new British disease is the superbug in our hospitals which it is estimated kills at least 5,000 people a year."