Star gives £275,000 for facemasks as fearful medics ‘hide equipment’
Scottish X-men star James Mcavoy has donated £275,000 to Crowdfunding initiative Masks For NHS Heroes, a campaign set up by four doctors to provide protective equipment for NHS staff.
Scottish X-men star James Mcavoy has donated £275,000 to a campaign set up by four doctors to provide protective equipment for NHS staff.
Crowdfunding initiative Masks For NHS Heroes has raised more than £555,000 since launching, to ensure that hospitals have adequate supplies of provide protective equipment (PPE) for frontline staff.
The Glaswegian actor was moved by their fight and said NHS were “heroes” in the fight against coronavirus.
His donation was revealed as a doctor in one hospital said staff were hiding PPE to ensure they had it, and as Scotland’s Health Secretary Jeane Freeman announced that 34 million pieces of PPE had been delivered to frontline staff, with GP surgeries set to get eight weeks’ worth in advance this week.
As well as the donation, Mcavoy, 40, who appeared in His
Dark Materials and Shameless, made a video in support of the campaign. He said: “NHS staff are heroes. We must do all that we can to protect them, support them and thank them.
“Nurses and doctors have described a lack of personal protective equipment. Caring for people with Covid-19 without access to proper masks, goggles, gowns and gloves puts themselves and others at risk.
“That’s why I’m supporting the efforts of four NHS doctors ... to plug this urgent gap. Thank you, NHS.”
The campaign founders wrote: “Unfortunately current hospital supplies are not sufficient and, while we are reassured the Government is doing everything it can, healthcare workers on the frontline are risking themselves daily without adequate protection to care for sick patients.
“Healthcare workers on the frontline without PPE (personal protective equipment) is the equivalent of going to war without armour and protection.”
The fundraising comes amid claims by medics that hospital staff are hiding PPE as shortages bite, while other workers falsely claim to be ill as they fear the provisions are inadequate.
Global shortages of the protective equipment for medics have led to shortfalls in the UK and numerous medics have come forward to express concerns about a lack of PPE in NHS hospitals. Staff at one hospital have taken to “hiding” equipment out of sheer desperation, a doctor said.
The obstetrician, who works in a London hospital, told the PA news agency that protective gear was being kept under lock and key by senior staff.
Another doctor compared the situation to sending a soldier to war without the necessary equipment, while a junior doctor said it feels like it is “inevitable” that they will contract the virus due to a lack of PPE.
“There is some but now we’re in a situation where people are having to hide them and store them for their own staff,” the obstetrician, who chose to speak anonymously, said. “Our bosses are having to store a certain number. We are working in a hospital where there are key workers, including orderlies, porters, healthcare assistants – they have a right to be protected too.
“Our orderly was walking around the ward yesterday with a sleep mask over her face – an eye mask over her nose and mouth as a makeshift mask.
“They’ve said she doesn’t need a mask because she’s not in contact with Covid patients but so many patients are asymptomatic. We should be managing patients as though everybody has it.”
She added: “There is not enough kit. PPE is locked away in our hospital and only one person has got the key because people are panicking. So some people are going in and grabbing some of the stuff because they want to walk around with a mask.
“What people are doing is, they are hiding them because they don’t want just anyone grabbing the kit, so the bottom line is there is not enough kit.
“[It is] out of sheer desperation, there is just not enough.”
Another frontline NHS doctor, who also worked for the Government in west Africa during the Ebola crisis, told PA: “All my colleagues are quite nervous – some people are going off sick because they don’t feel safe,” the doctor, who asked to remain anonymous, said. Others are seeking placement elsewhere so they are not frontline, again because of the lack of PPE.
“The closed Whatsapp groups are awash with fear, anger and confusion around the issues regarding PPE.”
A junior doctor at the Royal Bolton Hospital in Greater Manchester also said PPE was the main concern for health workers.
He told PA: “I just think at the moment the main thing from a healthcare worker is our concerns about PPE. You wouldn’t send a soldier out without the necessary equipment, so why are healthcare professionals not being provided with the adequate PPE?”
Yesterday Ms Freeman said in Scotland there was an “adequate supply of PPE, equating to six weeks’ worth”.
She added: “The distribution is led by clinical guidance about which items anyone should have and where.
“Staff know what these are but in order to reinforce that message we will be contacting staff in NHS and social care.”