'We were witnessing death on a scale no person or people should ever experience.' Consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist Dr Ben Black recalls being one of the few international workers present throughout the 2014 Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone.
Calls for change should be too loud to hear – but those on the frontline know too well that lessons can go unheeded.spoke to Metro
He also intersperses his account with parallel moments from his work on London’s NHS maternity wards during Covid. The coronavirus pandemic may have taken place six years after the Ebola epidemic, but according to Dr Black, lessons went unlearnt. The epidemic was out of control. Every day, we were receiving more patients. They were arriving from increasingly far away, meaning longer journeys squeezed in the back of ambulances, bouncing along those terrible roads. By the time the ambulances arrived, we would find patients who had died en route, and patients lying, dazed, next to them, disorientated and dehydrated.
On instruction, and quite sensibly, we would not touch anything from the ambulance. The referral papers for patients coming from other hospitals would be held only in gloves and read out to someone else to copy the information down. The driver, their ambulance and all that was in it represented an Ebola twilight zone. They were neither infected nor free of the risk of onwards transmission, and yet they were fundamental to the fight.
Death became so familiar it was a passing comment, a matter of fact. ‘Thirty-one, thirty-five and forty are dead; we’ll need one child and two adult body bags.’ I am chilled to think how those words rolled so easily off my tongue. It was just work. We had to get the dead out to get more living in, and so the wheel turned.
Deutschland Neuesten Nachrichten, Deutschland Schlagzeilen
Similar News:Sie können auch ähnliche Nachrichten wie diese lesen, die wir aus anderen Nachrichtenquellen gesammelt haben.
Full list of people who can claim free prescriptions on NHSThe NHS has provided guidance for people looking to save money on medical expenses
Weiterlesen »
NHS leaders more concerned about this winter than any previous oneWinter has always been a difficult time for the NHS but many trust leaders say that staff shortages, burnout, staff retention and staff absences are a growing concern.
Weiterlesen »
'My daughter died after her ambulance failed to turn up': Emotional caller warns against NHS strikeThis emotional caller has reached out to Sangita Myska, warning against the NHS nurse's strike, after being haunted for 30 years by his daughter's death after an NHS ambulance failed to escort her to a radiotherapy session amid strikes.
Weiterlesen »
Co-ordinated strikes for maximum disruption is only option, say NHS and civil service staff💬 'I do more work than I can do for less pay than I’ve ever got' 🔴 Co-ordinated strikes for maximum disruption is only option, say NHS and civil service staff
Weiterlesen »