ABOUT 1,400 tonnes of rock salt has been spread on Worcestershire’s roads in a bid to keep the county moving.

Temperatures plunged to their lowest of the recent cold snap on Tuesday night, reaching minus 7C (19F).

As well as the county’s gritting teams, medical staff in Worcestershire’s accident and emergency departments have been busy treating people who have fallen victim to the icy conditions.

Worcestershire Royal Hosp-ital’s A&E department experienced its busiest day of the year on Sunday.

Most of the visits were from people suffering broken bones after tripping up and slipping.

A total of 225 people attended A&E and 66 of them needed to be admitted. The average daily attendance is 161 people with 49 admissions.

To ease the pressure on A&E staff, people are being urged to use Worcester’s walk-in health centre in Farrier Street which offers GP appointments to anyone between 8am and 8pm every day of the year, including Christmas Day.

Worcestershire County Council’s fleet of 35 gritters have been operating since Wednesday, December 16, and officers say they are prepared should the weather turn even colder over Christmas.

Following a visit to Worcestershire’s two rock salt depots in Malvern and Bromsgrove, county councillor Derek Prodger, cabinet member for transport and safe environment, said: “The teams do a fantastic job throughout the winter period to keep roads safe and that’s been evident yet again over the last few days.

“They’ve been out, working hard, treating literally thousands of miles of roads in Worcestershire to keep them safe.”

He warned motorists to drive carefully and not assume it is safe to drive at speed just because a road has been gritted.

However, people living in one village street have complained that not enough is being done.

Carol Jones, aged 62, of Shrubbery Road, Drakes Broughton, near Pershore, said: “I have been ringing the council up every day but they keep telling me the same thing – that they will pass on my complaint.

“People are slipping all over the place because they can’t walk on the pavements or the roads.”

A Worcestershire County Council spokesman said about 850 miles of road in the county were being gritted during each treatment, but it was not possible to grit absolutely every road in the county.

He said: “At present each one of our 31 gritting vehicles is running at maximum capacity and after careful consideration we were not able to include Shrubbery Road, Drakes Broughton, on our designated route.”

The spokesman said the situation will be reviewed again next year.