Western Morning News (Saturday)

‘Burnout’ fears for NHS staff battling virus surge

- JOE GAMMIE

EMERGENCY healthcare staff at “battle stations” amid the rising number of coronaviru­s patients are at risk of burnout, a senior medic has warned.

Adrian Boyle, vice president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, said people were “tired, frustrated and fed-up”, while Saffron Cordery, deputy chief executive of NHS Providers, said the next few weeks would be “nail-bitingly difficult for the NHS”.

Dr Boyle told BBC Breakfast yesterday: “What is it going to be like over the next couple of months? I don’t know, I am worried. We are very much at battle stations.

“There will be short-term surges of morale but people are tired, frustrated and fed-up, as everybody is, whether they work in hospital or not.

“The people who go into emergency medicine expect it to be tough from time to time.

“There is a real worry about burnout.”

His comments come as the Royal College of Nursing’s England director, Mike Adams, said that staff leave was being cancelled to deal with the surge in demand.

Mr Adams also told Sky News the expectatio­n of a mass rollout in capacity through the Nightingal­e hospitals was “misplaced”.

He added: “If we are having to cancel leave to staff these areas, the obvious question is where will the staff come from to open the Nightingal­es?

“I am sure there will be moves to open some beds, there are some beds open in different Nightingal­e hospitals in different areas of the country.

“I have real concerns that the expectatio­n that this mass rollout in capacity can happen is misplaced because there aren’t the staff to do it.”

New Year’s Eve brought a new record high of 55,892 daily lab-confirmed cases in the UK – the highest since mass testing began in late May – with a further 964 deaths within 28 days of a positive test.

A British Medical Associatio­n (BMA) survey also found that 67% of doctors reported that current levels of fatigue and exhaustion were higher than normal as they tackle a mounting second wave and a growing backlog of care on top of the usual seasonal demand.

While more than a million people have now received their first coronaviru­s vaccinatio­n, a joint statement from England’s Professor Chris Whitty and the chief medical officers of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland said the public would “understand” and “thank” them for a plan to give first jabs as a priority, delaying the followup vaccinatio­n for others.

The deployment of the newly approved Oxford/AstraZenec­a vaccine will begin on Monday, almost a month after the rollout of the Pfizer/ BioNTech vaccine, but second doses of either will now take place within 12 weeks rather than 21 days as initially planned.

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