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Channel 4 documentary Surviving Covid shows how Londoners in King’s College Hospital fought for their lives

Gill Hussey with picture of husband David (Channel 4)
Gill Hussey with picture of husband David (Channel 4)

A TV documentary will tonight show how Londoners who became seriously ill with covid fought for their life in intensive care.

The harrowing film, Surviving Covid, follows four patients admitted to King’s College hospital in March in the first wave of the pandemic.

It follows them over the next six months as the virus takes its toll – and reveals the challenges medics face in coping with a new disease, and the emotional impact on the patients’ families.

<p>Mental health nurse Sama with his daughters after recovering from covid</p>Channel 4

Mental health nurse Sama with his daughters after recovering from covid

Channel 4

One patient, Sama, a 52-year-old psychiatric nurse, is put into an induced coma because he can no longer breathe on his own. He spends about two months in intensive care.

David Hussey, a 62-year-old builder, had only just been given the all-clear after a year-long battle with cancer when Covid-19 hit.

Tobi, 52, a pastor, has suffered multiple strokes, three cardiac arrests and kidney failure due to the virus.

<p>Joaquin Rodrigues and daughter-in-law Beatriz Arboled at King’s College hospital</p>Channel 4

Joaquin Rodrigues and daughter-in-law Beatriz Arboled at King’s College hospital

Channel 4

Joaquin Rodrigues, a 61-year-old hotel cleaner originally from Honduras, has been on a ventilator for 110 days when the film opens – and becomes one of the UK’s longest covid intensive care patients.

One critical care doctor says of Mr Rodrigues: “He has got significant complications from covid. His whole body has been affected – his brain, his lungs, his heart, his blood vessels, his kidneys.

“The ventilator is an intervention of last resort. He has got a much greater chance of dying than surviving this.”

Dr Tom Best, a consultant in critical care at King’s, in Denmark Hill, said: “I really hope this is a once in a lifetime kind of thing. The rates were so extraordinary in March. We saw one or two… then suddenly within two weeks we were completely overwhelmed. It was pretty frightening and an extraordinary thing.”

His colleague Dr Rob Elias: “We have dealt with large numbers of very sick people as a result of covid. An awful lot of tragedy, an awful lot of horrible situations where families have not been able to be with their loved ones.”

Mr Hussey deteriorates and doctors say death becomes “inevitable” as he reaches “the end of what intensive care can offer him”.

Dr Tom Hurst said: “The choice becomes between what we call a good death – a death that his family have some time to prepare for – versus an uncontrolled death, which might happen in the middle of the night with a very sudden deterioration or a cardiac arrest, and no opportunities for them to be with him or say their goodbyes.”

Mr Hussey’s widow Gill says: “It never crossed my mind that he wouldn’t make it. He was only 62.”

She added: “When covid first came around and we went into lockdown, I thought it was a made-up story… I would hate anyone to go through this.”

A total of 534 patients have died at King’s College NHS trust, which includes sister hospital the Princess Royal in Orpington, according to the latest NHS England data.

Across London last night there were 260 covid patients on ventilators.

Volunteer Helen Chown, who writes the names of the deceased in the hospital chapel’s memorial book, said: “It’s a bit of a shock to my system to be putting lots and lots of names down on the same day.”

* Surviving Covid is on Channel 4 at 9pm tonight, Wednesday.