Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus as the Call the Midwife Christmas Special will, once again, find its way to both BBC and PBS schedules on Christmas Day 2016. For this years special, the bicycle-riding, cardigan-wearing midwives of Nonnatus House find themselves transported to the Eastern Cape of South Africa. After receiving an SOS call from Hope Clinic, a tiny mission hospital which is understaffed, underfunded, and with a poor water supply, they soon learn that the struggling clinic is faced with closure.

Photo: BBC

Far from home and everything familiar, the Nonnatus House team are both shaken and exhilarated by the challenges they face – and by the time the mission trip is over, some lives are permanently changed.

Nonnatus House regulars, Jenny Agutter, Linda Bassett, Victoria Yeates, Laura Main, Stephen McGann, Jack Ashton, Helen George, Charlotte Ritchie and Cliff Parisi will make the journey where they will be joined by Sinead Cusack as Dr Myra Fitzsimmons who runs the troubled Hope Clinic.

While it will be more than difficult to get through new episodes knowing that Sister Evangelina has passed, there is more sad news to report to fans of the series as Chummy, played brilliantly by Miranda Hart, will not be getting back on her bike and returning to the friendly confines of Nonnatus House for the sixth series of Call the Midwife.

For series 6, that ladies of Nonnatus House find themselves in 1962, surrounded by social revolution and upheaval in the outside world, all mirrored by change and challenge much closer to home. As they continue to strive to help mothers and families cope with the demands of childbearing, disability, disease and social prejudice, they must make choices and fight battles of their own.

Call the Midwife creator Heidi Thomas explained, “As the team settle back into Poplar after their South African adventure, we‘ll see them grappling with all the contradictions and opportunities of the early Sixties – the beacon of the Pill, the shadow of the Kray twins, the lure of independence and the call to duty. And time and time again, in a age of change and danger, we will be reminded of the simple power of love.”

The holiday special will air on both PBS and BBC1 on Christmas Day with series six returning in January 2017 in the UK and April 2, 2017 on PBS in the States.