Thread by @DrEmilyGrossman

“Act as if everyone you know has just tested positive and you need to avoid them like - quite literally - the plague.”
Attached are screen shots of the full quote from a trusted doctor source in North London, reporting on the current situation there. Please share widely.

The doctor who wrote this is my friend. I know him. He wrote these words late at night to his family. I’m sharing them so his words get seen by more people in order to save lives. If he gives his name he may lose his job. It’s happened before to NHS workers who speak out.

NHS workers have been told not to speak out. It’s a breech of internal policy to leak conditions without communication department approval. There are careful trajectories for whistle blowers.

It’s also important to understand that stats on hospital bed occupancy are misleading. Lower occupancy than usual is to be expected, as routine operations, treatments and appointments are being cancelled and all available staff are being moved to Covid wards. ICUs are overflowing

For those demanding photographic evidence, here’s a photo of ambulances queuing outside Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham this evening. There’s a sick patient inside every one of them. They can’t even enter the building. Hospitals are at breaking point. (H/T @drpunith)

Here’s some more photos and an article from the @Independent. Mid and South Essex hospitals have declared an emergency. independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-n…

Another: “Patients w/ Covid-19 have been receiving care in emergency vehicles parked up outside Queen's Hospital in Romford, north east London, before being moved into the building. Rising numbers are putting health services under "significant pressure".” lbc.co.uk/news/covid-pat…

And another: “Ambulances with Covid patients seen queuing outside London hospitals as 'heartbreaking' pressure on NHS rises.” Photo and social media footage show ambulances queuing outside the Royal London Hospital with patients being treated inside them. itv.com/news/london/20…

Still don’t believe NHS London is at breaking point? On 26th Dec, London Ambulance Service received as many emergency calls as it did at the height of the first wave of Covid-19. Nearly 8,000 calls were received, a 40% increase on a typical "busy" day.
bbc.com/news/uk-englan…

Dr Mike Henley @trentconsultant: “I’ve been a hospital doctor for 30 years.This is an order of magnitude worse than other yrs. NHS is close to not being able to provide ICU care because there are too many sick.Hospitals struggling to provide enough basics like oxygen. It’s real.”

Dr @jamesewer: “Hospitals will feel empty, no visitors, admissions are down a bit. But w/ hundreds of patients all w/ the same pathology and all needing same resources (side rooms, O2, and possibly ventilators), the system is under enormous strain. Especially w/ a depleted staff”

Dr @thomasdolphin: “Hospital after hospital is activating surge plans & redeploying staff or declaring major incidents.We haven't even got to the part where Christmas gathering-related infections show up at hospital.Feels worse than March, perhaps because we all saw it coming.”

Dr @jamesewer: “Sadly the stories are true. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. Medical staff are posting these terrifying accounts to counter the tidal wave of misinformation being distributed. It is very demoralising to hear people accuse us of making it up.”

The Queen Elizabeth Hospital in southeast London has declared a major incident over fears about a shortage in oxygen caused by the demand from coronavirus patients. It was forced to ask ambulances to take emergency patients to other hospitals
independent.co.uk/news/health/co…

This is far worse than flu. 3x more people died from Covid this year than died from flu in 2018/19. “In 20 years of working for the NHS I have never heard of multiple hospitals running out of oxygen. I have never seen theatres being used as emergency ITUs.” @Compoundinator

“Hospitals could soon face “horrendous choices” about which Covid-19 patients receive potentially life-saving treatment because the NHS is so dangerously overloaded”
theguardian.com/world/2020/dec…

Dr Rachel Clarke @doctor_oxford: ‘We are overwhelmed with Covid patients...We are working with everything we've got.’ The number of Covid patients are 'unimaginable' and more younger people are in ICU as a result of Covid. Watch her interview @GMB here:

https://twitter.com/gmb/status/1344198742120005633?s=21

Dr Samantha Batt-Rawden @sbattrawden on @GMB: ‘I can’t express strongly enough how bad things are on the frontlines. If you are thinking about partying over New Year's Eve, please just stay at home.'

https://twitter.com/gmb/status/1344199756671803392?s=21

A thread with some compelling stats on numbers of ICU patients compared to previous years:

https://twitter.com/laconic_doc/status/1344257544898940928?s=21

Another stat on comparing Covid to flu: the worldwide death rate for Covid is at best 2.5 times higher than the annual death rate for flu and at worst 6 times higher.

hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditi…

In fact, the article above states: “the mortality rate of COVID-19....is thought to be substantially higher (possibly 10 times or more) than that of most strains of the flu."

https://twitter.com/bbcnews/status/1344601439583277057?s=21

Important thread from an NHS doctor @doctor_oxford on the frontline about what it’s actually like in hospitals right now:

https://twitter.com/doctor_oxford/status/1344586319536803840?s=21

People are asking how come the Nightingale Hospitals are still closed if there’s really so many extra patients? Simple answer - not enough staff.

If we want to stop this horror show, pls stay at home. Take 4000 IU (100 micrograms) of Vitamin D / day (healthy adults) Vitamindforall.org (Nothing to lose and everything to gain) And please accept the vaccine if you’re offered. Let’s work together to stop this pandemic 🙏

Another devastating article by NHS workers. Every time you see someone post something like "oh, it's not that bad", "they're making it up", “they're exaggerating it", please show them this thread and this article. People on the front line are suffering 😞 theguardian.com/commentisfree/…