Indian nurses delay joining Stafford hospital to help fight Covid crisis

Restrictions over travel to and from India mean the date the 45 nurses join the University Hospitals of North Midlands NHS Trust has been delayed.

The update was given at a board meeting for the hospital trust which runs both Stafford's County Hospital and the Royal Stoke University Hospital.

Chief executive Tracy Bullock said: "What we've talked about previously is around the Indian nurses that were going to join us in May – we had over 40 nurses that were going to join us. India aren't struggling for workforce resource, but as you know the flights to and from India have now ceased.

"Those nurses will not be joining us in May and actually it's probably the right thing to do – and a number of those nurses had already contacted us to say they'd like to delay coming until later in the year, so I think it's right that they stay and they support their own country and their own healthcare organisation. We don't know yet when we will be seeing those nurses – that's going to be left flexible."

Mrs Bullock said the organisation stood "in solidarity" with their healthcare partners in India and said the response was being coordinated, with India being asked what they require.

She said: "One of the things India is very much saying at the moment is staffing, from a workforce point of view, they are actually OK at the moment so they don't need our additional staffing.

"But there is some peer-to-peer support going on because we've been through this, we've done the surge etcetera, so we're offering peer support around that.

"The areas they're particularly asking for advice on are around ventilators and oxygen. In terms of some of the national support that's been given, they've been sent over 200 ventilators and they've been sent over 495 oxygen condensers and a whole range of medicines to support people on ventilators and drugs that have been used to treat Covid.

"What they have said is if individual organisations have got ventilators and oxygen condensers they're not using, please don't send them. So at the moment they are sending India what they need and this has been coordinated at an international level as well. So they're saying please do not send your resources individually outside of what's going on. If they need our equipment – or any medicines from us as an individual organisation they will contact us."

The chief executive said wellbeing support was being offered to staff at the Stafford's County Hospital and the Royal Stoke University Hospital who have relatives in India.

Mrs Bullock added: "From an individual organisational point of view, key thing for us is supporting our staff because we have a lot of staff from India and Pakistan, and Asia, who have family and relatives who are in India at the moment who are tied up in parts of this pandemic. So there's a number of things we've done – we've put out what support is available, wellbeing support from the national arena and from ourselves as well."