‘For days I just staggered between the sofa and my bed’

STEPHEN CRAIB WAS SO BADLY HIT BY CORONAVIRUS THAT HE HAD TO GO TO HOSPITAL – BUT AFTER HIS RECOVERY HE DONATED BLOOD PLASMA TO HELP RESEARCH INTO POSSIBLE TREATMENTS FOR COVID-19

“IT was when I couldn’t taste my pepperoni pizza that I knew something was up,” says Stephen Craib of the first symptoms of Covid-19 that landed him in hospital in March last year.

“I’d come home from work because I was really burning up with a fever, and I couldn’t smell or taste a thing,” recalls Stephen, from Carshalton, south London. “It was really early in the pandemic so I just assumed it was a virus.”

Stephen became so unwell that his sister Angie stepped in to help.

“Angie was really worried, so she moved in to nurse me,” says the 42-year-old Royal Mail manager. “For days I just staggered between the sofa and my bed.”

SHOCKING

A concerned Angie later called 999 and, with his blood oxygen levels then dangerously low, Stephen was admitted to hospital for eight days. “It was quite shocking – everyone was masked up and of course nobody could come in with me,” he says.

After Stephen was discharged, he donated plasma for use in medical research to find Covid-19 treatments, and has so far donated 18 times as part of the study. “It’s a piece of cake to do,” says Stephen, “like giving blood.”

To date, 16,000 units of high-antibody plasma have been donated. “Donations are vital to our ongoing lifesaving research, which gives us a better understanding of how we can best treat patients with Covid-19 and help prevent deaths in the future,” explains Professor Dave Roberts, associate director of blood donation at NHS Blood and Transplant. “To be ready for the future, the time to donate your plasma is now.”