BORIS: THANKS TO NHS ARMY OF 750,000 VOLUNTEERS
BORIS Johnson last night thanked the army of volunteers who have come to the aid of the NHS.
The Prime Minister paid tribute to 20,000 former members of staff who have come “back to the colours” and another 750,000 people who have volunteered to help out.
Speaking from his Downing Street flat where he is in isolation after coming down with the virus, he said: “Thank you to everybody who’s now coming back into the NHS in such huge numbers. It’s the most amazing thing.
“We are going to do it. We are going to do it together. I think one thing this crisis has already proved, is that there is such a thing as society.”
Less than a week after a call was issued by the NHS, the UK has now assembled the biggest charity workforce since the Second World War.
The extraordinary response has seen the Royal Voluntary Service recruit three times its initial target.
Unpaid workers will now help deliver essentials, transport patients and NHS equipment, and check in on those blighted by loneliness because of the Government-enforced lockdown.
Catherine Johnstone, RVS chief executive, said: “We have been absolutely overwhelmed by the response. As history shows it is often in times of crisis that we pull together and become our best selves.”
The response to the Your NHS Needs YOU campaign has seen recruitment halted temporarily.
The army will be staffed by those with time on their hands from self-isolating, but also those who have been made temporarily unemployed and want to help.
Ruth May, chief nursing officer for England, said she had been “absolutely bowled over”.
She added: “I want to thank each and every one of the 750,000 people who have committed their precious time to help some of the most vulnerable people stay home and save lives.
“Your generosity and goodwill
offers every one of us some light at the end of the tunnel.”
Volunteers will sign up via an app through which they can say they are “on duty”. GPs, doctors, pharmacists, nurses, midwives, and social care staff will be able to request help for their at-risk patients via a call centre.
It will be run by the RVS which will match people who need help with volunteers who live nearby.
Some charities will also be able
to refer people to the service which will complement thousands of other local schemes.
CF-sufferer Josh LlewellynJones, 32, from Cardiff, is himself at high risk from coronavirus.
But despite facing 12 weeks in self-isolation, every night at 7pm Josh holds a live online workout for children with cystic fibrosis.
He said: “For those with CF, who need to move about a lot, it’s becoming harder to get out and
exercise. I’m trying to end every day on a positive note.”
A restaurant in Blackpool is delivering hundreds of free meals to the over-70s and vulnerable.
Cube Bar Kitchen’s 50-strong team are cooking up batches of chilli, shepherd’s pie and curries and delivering them to residents unable to leave the house.
Manager Danielle Mellor, 33, said: “We just want to do something that will help and benefit
other people rather than wasting food. People are so thankful.”
The RVS and NHS will now focus on getting the first wave of volunteers into the community.
Ms Johnstone added: “Due to the volume of applications we have now paused recruitment and ask anyone still interested to wait for the process to reopen.”
It comes as a makeshift 4,000bed hospital was constructed at the ExCeL centre in London’s
Docklands after
Gurkha soldiers worked day and night – with similar operations in Manchester and Birmingham.
NHS chief executive
Sir Simon Stevens said: “It will take a monumental effort from everyone to beat this epidemic, but the NHS is mobilising like never before.”