Give health staff vital PPE equipment
Dear Editor, I am dismayed at the government’s handling of personal protective equipment (PPE) during the Covid-19 outbreak.
The World Health Organisation guidelines published on March 19 are clear.
They state that “healthcare workers providing direct care to COVID19 patients” should have: medical mask; gown; gloves and eye protection (goggles or face shield).
This is the minimum PPE that frontline NHS workers should have.
Those in higher risk situations, e.g. intensive care, should have more extensive protection.
The government says that they are taking action. But even the latest GOV. UK guidelines released last week, still do not meet WHO standards, particularly with regard to gowns.
Health Secretary Matt Hancock has spoken of the ‘Herculean’ PPE effort but this is unfortunately not being felt by many frontline workers who remain inadequately protected; 38 per cent of users of the NHS PPE app reported having no eye protection at all.
Many frontline staff do not have access to long sleeved gowns and have to take their potentially infected uniforms home to wash themselves, which also puts their families at risk.
These are just some of the reasons why I, along with over 738 000 others, have joined the campaign on change.org calling for adequate PPE for all frontline NHS workers.
I hope that our local MP will be proactive, not reactive, and show solidarity with our frontline healthcare workers.
I’d like to encourage everyone else in our area to sign the petition at change. org/PPEnow
Mike Downham Milndavie Crescent Strathblane
In his shop he had a chair in front of the counter for some of his more elderly customers so that they could come in and solve the world’s problems.
On one occasion I witnessed my favourite memory of Sandy. His customer was enquiring about vests. Sandy’s shop was one of the few places where a man could still buy a ‘proper’ vest. Sandy was explaining why.
He said: “Ye ken, it was all to do with yon laddie frae Edinburgh, that Sean Connery. When he was in his James Bond film with a woman, he’d take his shirt off and you could see he wasn’t wearing a vest! From then on, sales of vests plummeted, and they’ve never recovered since!”
So ye ken the noo!
Graham Bacon, Dunblane
At best, it is an Americanisation of the phrase ‘stay at home’.
Things are surely bad enough without our having to put up with this sort of insult to our intelligence.
Mary Maxwell-Irving, Telford House, Blairlogie