Medics did not think poisoned Russian spy and daughter would survive

A consultant who treated poisoned Russian former double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, has revealed he did not think the pair would survive.

Another doctor at Salisbury District Hospital said speak- ing to other staff about the attempted assassination using a nerve agent was like nothing he could have imagined in his “wildest imagination”.

Medics at the hospital spoke to the BBC’S Newsnight programme about the extraordinarysituationtheyfacedwhen the Skripals were rushed into their care after being found unconscious from the effects of the military nerve agent Novichok on a bench in Salisbury on 4 March.

Dr Stephen Jukes, intensive care consultant, said: “When we first were aware this was a nerve agent we were expecting them not to survive. We would try all our therapies.

“We would ensure the best clinical care. But all the evidence was there that they would not survive.”

Dr Duncan Murray, head of the intensive care department, said: “I spoke to the nurse in charge who had been on that night and it was this conversation I really could never have imagined in my wildest imagination having with anyone.”

Lorna Wilkinson, director of nursing at the hospital, said she was left wondering how big the situation would get when a third person, policeman Nick Bailey, was also admitted to the hospital in connection with the poisoning incident.

She said she began thinking: “Have we just gone from having two index patients having something that actually could become all-consuming and involve many casualties? Because we really didn’t know at that point.”

The hospital’s medical director Dr Christine Blanshard, told Newsnight the long-term prognosis for the trio was still unknown.