The Press and Journal (Inverness, Highlands, and Islands)
Health boss helped people fleeing Sudan
Ahealth manager has spoken of the harrowing cases she dealt with while volunteering to support Britons fleeing war-torn Sudan.
British Red Cross volunteer Liz Tait, from Lossiemouth, was deployed to Cyprus when the violence erupted in Sudan last month.
She was part of the UK Government’s operation to rescue more than 2,450 people from the country – where more than 600 people have been killed.
“The memory that sticks most in my mind was a lady, probably the same age as me, who had to leave her terminally ill husband behind,” she said.
“They both held British passports, but he was certainly not well enough to make that journey. I think he was very much towards end-of-life and she was absolutely heartbroken because she knew she would never see him again.
“It must have been the worst of dilemmas, but the husband had very much wanted her to go. He wanted to die knowing that she had escaped to safety.”
The 64-year-old sat with the woman to talk and to reassure her she had made the right decision.
When she is not supporting those in emergency situations through the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), Ms Tait works as a clinical governance expert for NHS Grampian.
In the past, she has been deployed to China, Afghanistan, Dominica and Tunisia to offer crucial support for people going through “the most appalling distressful situations”.
She said: “Just having someone there to discuss how they are feeling and letting them talk about their experience and acknowledging what they’ve been through and offering support can make such a massive difference to a person’s recovery.
“People were describing very, very difficult journeys,” she said. “There were stories of people having their cars taken from them at gunpoint.
“There was one person who had been travelling with her parents when they came under attack. They’d all run for their lives, but they had no idea where her parents were. It had been too dangerous to go back and look for them. It was very distressing to hear.
“People had also been taken at gunpoint out of their houses.”
The UK Government’s rescue of 2,450 people from Sudan has been the longest and largest evacuation by any Western nation. More than 700,000 people are estimated to have been forced to flee in fear.