Doctors make social media appeal for kit

DOCTORS at St James’s Hospital in Dublin have taken to social media to appeal for people to send them personal protection equipment as their staff fight the coronavirus.

A significant proportion of those who tested positive for the disease have been healthcare workers, HSE figures show.

In a video posted yesterday, consultant respiratory physician Dr Anne Marie McLaughlin said: ‘We need personal protective equipment, masks, gowns, gloves. If you work in the pharma or food industry and have personal protective equipment, we need them.

‘I guarantee they will be used by our frontline staff.’

The Association of Chinese Professionals in Ireland responded to the call out and donated 10,000 surgical masks to protect frontline workers.

In addition, the Agriculture and Food Development Authority Teagasc said that it would be donating its surplus personal protection equipment (PPE) to frontline staff as well as offering use of their buildings where necessary.

This is not the first time that people have tried to crowdsource PPE for frontline healthcare workers.

Over the weekend, Dublinbased management consultant Miriam Ahern was able to source PPE for a Dublin hospital through a call out on Twitter following a conversation she had with an emergency doctor friend of hers.

Speaking yesterday on Virgin Media News, Health Minister Simon Harris said that healthcare workers were right to highlight this issue and that more protection equipment is on the way.

‘We secured a very, very big order from China and, in fairness to the health service, that was not easily done, there is a global shortage of this,’ he said, adding he expects it to be here by Sunday.