A hospital trust with one of the highest rates of the MRSA superbug in the country has been accused of failing the people in its care.

Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust faced fierce criticism from a patients' group which said it was defending an "indefensible" record of infection rates.

The Patient and Public Involvement Forum, an independent body representing the views of those who use trust hospitals, condemned standards of cleanliness.

It said the trust was failing in its duty to keep wards clean and infection-free.

The criticism came after the trust claimed it was doing everything it could to combat the spread of the potentially lethal superbug, despite most other hospitals performing better.

The trust said there were no plans to change its methods of battling MRSA despite its poor league table position.

Forum vice-chairman Janice Kent said: "Patients deserve hospitals fit for the 21st Century. They should be cleaned more regularly."

A spokeswoman for the trust provoked an angry response from the patients' forum by saying: "What do you want me to say that we should just close the hospital and clean it from top to bottom?"

Mrs Kent said cleaning hospitals from top to bottom was exactly what the trust should be doing.

She said: "There was a time when hospitals were scrubbed thoroughly every day and levels of infection were nothing like today.

"It's nonsense to say cleanliness has nothing to do with infection. I am sad when doctors and nurses are blamed for the problem because it is the fault of inadequate cleaning."

The trust spokeswoman said: "We are doing everything we can. We just need to shout louder to make sure the message is getting through to staff."

She said MRSA, which is carried in the bloodstream, can only be passed on by person-to-person contact, not by everyday dirt.

People in Brighton and Hove needed to take responsibility for preventing infection when they came into hospital just as much as staff do, by washing their hands properly.

Mrs Kent rejected the trust's defence that MRSA is carried in the community and brought into hospitals by patients and visitors.

She said: "So, it's our fault that the hospitals are dirty? It's true patients are admitted to hospital already infected with MRSA but it's not a problem until it gets into open wounds.

"The whole hospital should be cleaned from top to bottom every day, down to regular cleaning of the beds."

The Argus revealed yesterday the trust, which runs the Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton and the Princess Royal Hospital in Haywards Heath, had the third-highest infection rate in a Department of Health league table of 175 trusts across the country.

Trust medical director Dr Charles Turton said it was a myth hospital cleanliness and MRSA rates were linked.

He said: "I don't think cleaning every five minutes is the answer to solving MRSA.

"The reason we have high rates is we have a greater proportion of critically-ill patients in intensive care or in renal surgery who are more at risk of infection.

"Other big specialist hospital trusts, like University Hospital Birmingham and Cambridge University Hospital, are also low down on the league table because they also have a higher number of very sick patients."

Dr Turton said a dedicated infection control team has been in action for the last six months, supported by 28 matrons and more than 90 infection prevention and control nurses.

He said: "The team has been inspecting wards, observing what the clinical teams are doing and giving them feedback on their practice.

"If there is an outbreak of infection they investigate it and try to find out what caused it."

He said the trust was also part of the national Clean Your Hands campaign, targeting staff and visitors. Dr Turton said cleanliness was important to the trust and mattresses were cleaned more often.

Dr Turton said: "We network regularly with other hospitals to find out how they are combating MRSA and we will be talking to them to find out what else we can do."