Retrospective plans to build the Exeter Nightingale Hospital on the site of the former Homebase store in Sowton have been approved.
The new NHS Nightingale Hospital, which comprises of five wards, each with 24 beds, providing 120 bed spaces in total, was initially designed to cope with a surge of Covid-19 cases.
But with the number of people in the South West having been hospitalised remaining low, it was repurposed for those needing other treatments, particularly cancer testing.
It has begun to take its first patients – and the £23m hospital has been given a new injection of cash to help to clear the backlog of seriously ill people caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Exeter City Council planning officers granted permission for the Nightingale hospital under delegated powers.
The temporary planning permission means that use of the site must cease on or before September 30, 2022, with the decision notice issued saying that use is unsuitable on a permanent basis in this locality.
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