TWO wards at a Liverpool hospital were closed to new admissions after patients and staff were struck down by a "winter bug", it emerged today.

About 60 patients and staff at the Royal Liverpool University Hospital contracted the illness, a mild form of gastro-enteritis, which causes diarrhoea and vomiting.

One ward at the hospital was closed to admissions last Tuesday and a second ward on Thursday. They reopened on Monday and Tuesday of this week.