Wife ‘starved herself to death’ after husband stopped from visiting

A GRIEVING husband whose wife starved herself in a care home after he was prevented from visiting said a doctor considered listing coronavirus as her cause of death. Shaikh Rehman would spend six hours a day feeding and caring for his wife, Rosemary.

The retired architect was told in early April that he could no longer enter Castlemead Court care centre in Newport Pagnell, Bucks, due to restrictions to prevent Covid-19, despite having bought his own personal protective equipment. Without her husband, and despite the best efforts of the home, Rosemary, 75, began refusing to eat or drink and died on April 23.

Mr Rehman, 81, claims a doctor wanted to record Covid-19 as the cause of death, but he objected because he believed that she had no symptoms. He asked that his wife’s self neglect, her failure to eat, should be recorded. But the GP is alleged to have told him he couldn’t agree to his request.

Kingfisher Surgery in Newport Pagnell, whose GP wrote the death certificate, told The Mail on Sunday it was a legal requirement for a doctor to determine the cause or causes of death “in accordance with the patient’s clinical presentation”. Her death certificate stated that she died of “frailty of old age”, which Mr Rehman also disputes.

“By the time I was finally allowed to see Rosemary, just before she died, she was a bag of bones. She starved herself to death,” he said.

His solicitor, Emma Jones, has written to the coroner requesting an inquest. Mr Rehman accepts care staff could not force his wife to eat, but criticises the decision to deny him entry.

Excelcare, which runs Castlemead, said procedures were in place to “protect those under our care and the people who look after them”, adding: “We hope Mr Rehman was able to take some comfort from the time he was able to spend with his wife in her final stages.”