one of the latest NHS staff victims of
the pandemic was a pregnant nurse
working at the Luton and Dunstable
University Hospital Mary Aggie Oppong
who was 28 said to be a highly valued
and loved nurse who had been admitted to
hospital last week and doctors say her
child was delivered successfully and is
doing very well among other NHS staff
who've died is dr. Peter ton a
specialist at the Royal Berkshire
Hospital the total number of NHS staff
who've died so far is 45 our
correspondent Andy Moore has more
details a hospital like many across the
country dealing with a surge of
coronavirus patients Luton and Dunstable
University Hospital has seen dozens of
deaths from kovat 19 on Sunday they lost
one of their own Mary a JIRA agile pom
also known as Mary mo was 28 she'd been
a nurse for several years after
completing her training in the UK it's
understood she'd been working during the
latter stages of her pregnancy but her
NHS Trust says she was not treating
coronavirus patients she tested positive
on the 5th of April and she was admitted
to hospital two days later her daughter
was delivered by cesarean section when
her condition worsened David Carter the
chief executive of Bedfordshire
Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust said Mary
worked here for five years and was a
highly valued and loved member of that
team a fantastic nurse and a great
example of what we stand for in this
trust our thoughts and deepest
condolences are with Mary's family and
friends at this sad time a fundraising
page has been set up online for Mary's
family it describes her as a blessing to
everyone she came across it adds that
her love care and sincerity will be
irreplaceable one person who gave money
said Mary's memory would live on in her
beautiful baby girl Andy Moore BBC news
with me as Hume our health editor was
with me once again I asked you about the
official briefing today Hugh about the
figures did you detect any suggestion or
hint from the government's expert
that we might be heading towards some
kind of improvement well here quite a
lot of interest has been taken in a
remark by Chris witty the government's
chief medical advisor at the briefing
when he said we are probably reaching
the peak overall and he talked about a
flattening of the curve so what was he
talking about well one of the charts
shown was for hospital patient numbers
in different parts of the UK and you can
see there in London they've come down a
bit that red line pretty flat elsewhere
up a bit in the East of England fairly
flat in Scotland and Wales no data
available from Northern Ireland but then
he went on to say we're not yet at the
point where we can confidently and
safely say that this has gone past the
peak and we can start thinking about the
next phase he in fact warned that death
numbers may go up in the next few days
the death toll he talked about it
bouncing back possibly even tomorrow
because of a delay in registering deaths
over the bank holiday weekend and I
think the tone from him and other
government officials is they really
don't want people to start thinking
there's light at the end of the tunnel
they want people to realize that the
peak may last for a little while and
there's no suggestion based on any of
this that any of the current guidelines
should be relaxed here once again thanks
very much keep him there our health
editor well a partnership between
clinicians and university researchers
and Industry which we reported on a few
weeks ago has now resulted in the
production of 10,000 breathing aids for
coronavirus patients who were seriously
ill this afternoon Mercedes formula 1
completed manufacture of the continuous
positive airway pressure or CPAP devices
which were designed in partnership with
engineers at University College London
initial trial suggests that they may be
able to save more patients from needing
the use of ventilators our medical
correspondent Fergus Walsh has the story
this is the stark reality of intensive
care in this time of coronavirus Royal
Surrey County Hospital in Guildford has
many critically ill patients on
ventilators I just remember it being
really really difficult to breathe and
it was hurt to breathe it's horrible
it literally scared me I thought that
was and they were taking me away
Tim Hall is over the worst the 37 year
old spent four days on an alternative
breathing device known as CPAP
which pushes oxygen under pressure into
the lungs it meant he didn't need to go
on a ventilator which requires sedation
just being able to being able to know
what's going on and who's around you and
that again I think makes a big
difference so being awake the CPAP
devices have been manufactured by
Mercedes Formula One in Northamptonshire
quite a contrast to their usual job of
designing engines for motor racing
they've just finished an order of 10,000
of them for the NHS it was done in
partnership with engineers at University
College London who modified and improved
an existing design the manufacturing
process has been made freely available
as a consortium where we're really
dedicated to supporting the global
efforts around kovat and in response to
that we released all of the designs and
manufacturing processes for the device
at zero cost
since then we've approved over 1,300
downloads of these different designs and
that's across 25 countries the more of
these devices that are made available
the less pressure they'll be on
ventilators a limited resource which are
needed for the most severely ill
patients
all the medical staff on intensive care
at Royal Surrey must wear full
protective clothing because of the
danger of infection they know all too
well the threat posed by corona virus so
you can see normal CT scan here and this
CT scan we've covered pneumonia in the
sickest patients corona virus causes
severe pneumonia what it tells us is
that the lung tissue is damaged and the
damage is associated with leakage of
fluid and cells into the lung so it
stops the little blooms intellect the
alveoli working properly and you can see
this is really quite significant all
this is abnormal tissue here
national data shows that of more than
1,600 coronavirus patients in intensive
care who finished treatment around half
have died but an even higher number who
remained in critical care their outcome
still uncertain doctors trialing the
CPAP device hope it will mean more
patients will survive like Tim who has
this message on social distancing and I
think you think that his wife got
outside voice not well not when you
could also potentially see you kids for
that last time or you know or even even
a week or so without one is hard enough
so that that point of milk whatever it
is it's not worth it the CPAP machine
was approved by medical regulators in
just days that's in stark contrast to
several new models of ventilator
including one by Dyson none of which
have received the go-ahead for use in
the NHS furgus watch BBC news