Cyberattack hit 'one in five' NHS England trusts, says Amber Rudd

All A&Es are back up and running after a cyberattack hit almost one in five NHS England trusts, Amber Rudd has confirmed.

Speaking after an emergency COBRA meeting, the Home Secretary confirmed that of the 248 NHS England trusts, 48 had been affected.

She said all but six trusts were now running as normal after experts had been working "around the clock" to restore systems.

"I'd like to commend the work that NHS staff have done to ensure the hospitals and patient surgeries continue to run smoothly," said Ms Rudd.

"In fact, 97% of the NHS trusts and hospitals... are working as normal."

NHS trusts have come under fire for failing to stop using outdated software that left them at risk.

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However, Ms Rudd added: "If you look at who's been impacted by this virus, it's a huge variety across different industries and across international governments.

"This is a virus that attacked Windows platforms... I don't think it's to do with that preparedness.

"There's always more we can all do to make sure we're secure against viruses, but I think there have already been good preparations in place by the NHS to make sure they were ready for this sort of attack."

But, speaking before the meeting, she told Sky News that trusts had been warned to upgrade their systems and that she was "disappointed" many had not done so.

NHS Digital said the impact of the cyberattack could continue and added: "The situation is changing and impacting organisations in a range of different ways."

One of the hospitals still affected is the Royal London Hospital, which is implementing its major incident plan.

Sky reporter Dan Whitehead said on Saturday night there was still a "mountain of paperwork" in reception and people were doing things "pretty manually".

Nissan, which has a plant in Sunderland, was also one of the many businesses worldwide that was hit by the attack.

A worker at the plant told Sky News that work had ground to a halt on Friday night as the ransomware countdown clock appeared on computers on the production line.

Both car production lines at the factory were due to be closed down over the weekend anyway and Nissan said there had been "no major impact".

Meanwhile, patients have told Sky News how there was "chaos" and "pandemonium" in hospitals as computers shut down "one-by-one" and doctors lost track of patient notes, blood tests and drugs.

Shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth has written a letter to Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt, saying concerns were repeatedly flagged about the outdated computer systems.

Mr Hunt has yet to give a statement on the situation, but Theresa May said no records had been compromised and also thanked NHS staff for working through the night.

She said: "Europol has said that it is unprecedented in terms of the scale of the cyberattack that has taken place.

"The National Cyber Security Centre is working with all organisations here in the UK that have been affected and that's very important."

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NHS systems were infected with a "ransomware" virus, which locked down machines and access to patient records, and demanded money to release them.

Experts say the virus, called Wanna Decryptor, exploits a vulnerability in Microsoft Windows software, which was identified by the US National Security Agency (NSA).

Microsoft released a patch for the issue in March but computers that have not been updated are still vulnerable to the attack.

Ms Rudd told Sky News: "It is disappointing that they have been running Windows XP - I know that the Secretary of State for Health has instructed them not to and most have moved off it."

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn branded the attackers "a bunch of 21st Century highway robbers" and said the Government should have renewed a multimillion-pound security package.

Last year a Sky News investigation discovered that NHS trusts were putting patients at risk, with seven trusts spending nothing on cybersecurity in 2015.