Barts Hospital solves its cash problem... by leasing out Sherlock 'shrine'

When Sherlock Holmes chose it for an apparent suicide leap, St Bartholo-mew’s Hospital became an unlikely cult location for legions of fans.

Now the old pathology building in Smithfield, from which the great detective — played by Benedict Cumberbatch — faked his death, could be reborn in a “multi-million-pound” plan to help restore Barts’ finances.

It has become a shrine to Sherlock fans since Cumberbatch — and a stunt double — plunged from the roof of the five-storey building at the end of the second BBC series in 2012.

The walls are daubed in “Sherlock lives” graffiti and the red phone box beside which Holmes fell is decorated with “love-locks” and Post-it notes bearing Sherlock quotations. “It’s a place of pilgrimage,” said Crispin Walkling-Lea, clinical adviser at Barts Health. “It has a bit of a cult following. You see people outside taking photographs, they have drawn and written on the windows.”

Barts Health today began inviting bids to lease the old pathology building, plus disused staff accommodation nearby, to a private hospital. With a £135 million deficit predicted this financial year — the largest ever in the NHS — trust bosses say increasing the £2 million annual revenue Barts Health currently earns from private care is “elementary” as a means to subsidise NHS patients.

They believe the site offers a rare central London opportunity for a private health firm, and could enable Barts consultants to bring their NHS work and private practice closer together.

Barts Health plans to lease rather than sell the buildings in the hope of securing long-term revenue.

Much of the central square within St Bartholomew’s — which was founded in 1123 — is Grade I listed. The pathology block and former staff quarters, both in Giltspur Street, have been empty for years, but the rest of the site has been transformed, culminating with the op-ening of Barts Heart Centre last year.

Mr Walkling-Lea said: “It’s great we still have some of the most historic buildings, and some of them still in use for clinical care. This is a development opportunity — it’s an empty shell.”

Barts Health added: “These buildings are no longer used for NHS services, are dilapidated and Barts Health does not have the resources to develop the site for NHS use. It will lease the land to a private operator, who will meet the entire costs of restoring and equipping the buildings for use as a modern healthcare facility. The unit would be funded and staffed entirely by the private provider.”