Death of consultant who lived for NHS

AMGED EL-HAWRANI was passionate about the NHS. He dedicated his life to the cause. Helping people, his family said, was in his blood.

It was tragic then, that Dr El-Hawrani would lose his life doing just that.

The ear, nose and throat specialist was, in his brother’s words, “surely in one of the most dangerous positions” as he continued to see and treat sick patients when coronavirus began to cast its shadow across the UK.

The 55-year-old was one of the first frontline doctors to die when, on Mar 28, medics at Glenfield Hospital, in Leicester, reluctantly turned off his ventilator.

His funeral in Bristol three days later was like “being in an apocalyptic movie”.

Raff (Ahmed) El-Hawrani, 49, told

“We all had to travel in separate cars, then stand two metres apart. We couldn’t comfort each other. I can’t begin to imagine what my mum’s going through.”

Dr El-Hawrani was born in Khartoum, Sudan, in 1964, the second of six boys. The family was among one of the earliest waves of immigrants from Sudan. After a few years, they moved from London to Bristol, before Amged studied at the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin.

In 1992, his brother Ashraf suffered a fatal asthma attack aged just 29, before Amged married Pamela Foley in her home town of Tullow, Co Carlow, in 1996.

The couple then moved to Scotland, where their son Ashraf was born in 2002, and later relocated to the East Midlands, where Dr ElHawrani worked at Queen’s Hospital in Burton.

In February, Dr El-Hawrani felt unwell after visiting his mother, Kawther, who had pneumonia. As his condition deteriorated, he was admitted to Queen’s, where he was put on a ventilator.

He was transferred to Glenfield Hospital, where, after a negative test, he was tested for coronavirus again and his family was told he had the deadly disease.

Dr El-Hawrani never knew. And then the machines were turned off.