Thread by @EveryDoctorUK

Thread No. 6 of "Freedom Day" anonymised EveryDoctor Member stories:

“I'm a self-employed GP working in London 111 clinics, urgent care clinics in A&E, and in GP practices. The demand we face currently is unprecedented. Every appointment is booked within minutes... ⏱️

of telephone lines opening. Waiting times in A&E are frequently 3 to 4 hours long.
COVID-19 patients are exponentially rising across the board. Staff are tired+burnt out. Patients are angry+frustrated. This is not sustainable.

Abandonment of social distancing + masking guidelines 😷 is ill-advised and foolish, at best. It means that the NHS will be on its knees within weeks.
I hear the arguments about how “we have to go back to normal at some point”, but...

millions of people all over the UK of all ages who are sick and incapacitated due to COVID will most certainly set back our return to normal, not to mention the risk of more devastating mutations evolving + the inability...

to gain control of already dangerously lengthy waiting lists. This will also inevitably lead to yet more delayed cancer diagnoses and substandard patient care across the board.

I believe we are much more likely to get on top of…

this by exercising caution and taking the opening up in a more considered, intelligent and careful way.
Please listen properly to the scientists and not the anti-vaxxer anti-masker covid-deniers. Please try to avoid looking inwards and instead start to look outwards, globally...

to other countries 🌏 who have managed the pandemic so much better than we have; approach them + humbly ask for their advice. Our death toll and economic slump are almost unparalleled across the world + we need to figure out why this is.

Why have we done, and continue to do, so badly?

We all want this to end, but burying our heads in the sand + blindly marching into “Freedom Day” is going to lead to longer restrictions + suffering for the whole country...

and more pressingly, to 100,000s more preventable deaths. Please rethink this act of abject negligence

- a GP, London
#FreedomDay