Garraway tribute to nurses who cared for husband

Kate Garraway has paid tribute to the nurses who “poured love and skill” into her husband Derek Draper during his battle with Covid.

The former political adviser, 53, was in hospital for a year after being admitted with coronavirus symptoms and being placed in a coma.

He has now been reunited with Garraway and their children Darcey and Billy at their family home.

Marking International Nurses Day, she told Heart Breakfast: “We all go ‘that doctor who saved my life’, ‘thank you to that incredible surgeon’, but as I’ve seen over the last 14 months, it’s actually the care of nurses that – especially when you’re dealing with something like Covid where there is no cure, and not enough is yet known about how to treat the symptoms although I’m sure the medical profession will get there – it’s their incredible care that has saved Derek’s life. It’s that simple.”

She added: “I did a little bit of work with the Royal College of Nursing a few years back, and before then I was very ignorant, and I saw nurses very much in the role of the nurse from Fireman Sam... so they came along and put plasters on.

“It was a turning point for me watching them talk to Derek, because finding joy right now for everybody, which is why today’s so important, is so hard, and I was struggling to hang on to hope, whilst also thinking ‘am I just being unrealistic?’.

“But when I watched them pouring love and skill into Derek... they had no idea whether they could win the war against Covid and they also are putting their own lives at risk by exposing themselves to Covid, I just thought that’s just the definition of hope, it makes me want to cry now.”