The government will today launch a new initiative aimed at improving the cleanliness of hospitals, as new figures reveal that 5,000 patients die every year as a result of infections contracted after they were admitted.

The numbers of deaths are greater than those from HIV/Aids, drugs and road accidents combined.

Health minister Lord Warner will launch a new guide for hospitals, setting out how every part of the institutional environment should be cleaned.

However, the Conservatives have argued that this will be the 22nd initiative on cleanliness launched since Labour came to power in 1997.

"It is a national scandal," said shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley.

"Over the last seven years, deaths from MRSA have doubled.  It has been clear for years that the actions required included closing wards and giving patients the right to refuse hospitals or wards where there is infection.

"Nurses should have the power to stop admissions to wards."

Writing in the Independent Michael Howard - who has made hospital cleanliness a priority for a future Tory government - describes how his mother-in-law died after contracting MRSA.

"We can clean our hospitals and stop this waste of life," he says.

"But more gimmicks and stunts from a government that is all talk will never do so.  It is time for a government who will."