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This time last year, we were picking up the phone on Britain's first major #coronavirus outbreak at the
@brightonargus. On the anniversary of the city's first reported case, I asked those caught up in the crisis how they are coping today. @Independent https://www.independent.co.uk/independentpremium/long-reads/coronavirus-uk-brighton-first-outbreak-b1797526.html
@brightonargus. On the anniversary of the city's first reported case, I asked those caught up in the crisis how they are coping today. @Independent https://www.independent.co.uk/independentpremium/long-reads/coronavirus-uk-brighton-first-outbreak-b1797526.html
This is the story as we heard it in the newsroom of the local paper — as the first wave began to break, and the calls came flooding in from brave and terrified people across #Brighton
One call came from a frightened nurse. She'd been at hospital treating a suspected Covid patient before she was sent home in a cab and told to stay indoors. She was among the first in the country told to self-isolate, before the term was fully understood https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/18231078.nurse-coronavirus-self-isolation-speaks-alleged-mismanagement/
She was told to get her children out of the house, and held back tears as she described being separated from her family. “What do I do now?” she asked. “I thought there would be a plan in place for something like this.” Neither of us realised the gravity of her words at the time.
Today, she feels like she’s in the eye of a storm. The mounting crisis at her hospital has brought a strange sense of calm. She's grown used to seeing patients die. She's had Covid now. She passes the beds of the sick and feels "like a soldier who’s been at war for a long time”
Several weeks in, @brightonargus reporter @JodyyDC broke terrible news. Three-quarters of the residents at a nursing home in Hove had become infected, in one of the country’s first care home outbreaks to make the headlines https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/18327324.coronavirus-suspected-outbreak-oaklands-nursing-home-hove/
Earlier this week, I spoke to Lucy Rutler, whose father was among those who died after becoming infected at the home. His name was Hugh Francis. He was 85 and a retired doctor. He’d been monitoring his own symptoms from his bed.
Lucy misses her dad. She said: “In that first outbreak, people who lost their loved ones did not get to say goodbye – they didn’t get to hold their hands. One of the hardest things was knowing my dad died without his family by his side.”
As infections rose, we began to hear from people #shielding. Mike Dicks was one of them. He suffers from leukaemia and is at high risk from Covid-19. For more than 300 days he's barely left his flat other than to put out the bins and go for blood tests https://www.theargus.co.uk/news/18496085.hove-leukaemia-patient-will-keep-shielding-until-safe/
Next week brings hope: Mike is getting his first vaccination. He's looking forward to the moment he can see his son again. I’m so happy for you @mikedicks. There is light at the end of the tunnel, even as many are still confronting the worst of the virus.
We’re still in lockdown, with over 100,000 dead and hundreds more dying every day. Looking back at those first frightening weeks, it is the voices and stories of the callers who opened up over the phone that I remember most. I’m glad we wrote them down.
When people look back in 50 or 100 or 500 years’ time, they will want to know how it felt to live through this crisis.
And they will be able to read about Mike, the brave cancer patient who spent months alone in his flat, and Lucy, the daughter who could not hold her dying father’s hand, and the scared nurse who felt like a battle-weary soldier as she stood at the bedsides of the sick.
Those stories, of suffering and strength, are there because all over the city people called in – and we picked up the phone.
