Three people have been found dead and four people have been taken to hospital after an incident at a Dorset care home, police said.

Emergency services are at the scene at Gainsborough Care Home in Ulwell Road in Swanage, with remaining residents having been evacuated to a safe location.

Dorset Police said the deaths are currently being treated as unexplained, but a Dorset Council councillor told the PA news agency there is a “suspicion” that “this could be attributable to carbon monoxide but it has not been proven”.

Katie Lobban, a spokesperson for SGN, a gas distribution company, said they were called to Gainsborough Care Home in Swanage earlier on Wednesday as the national gas emergency service for the south of England.