As I've already said, 2 weeks ago, I, a coal face radiographer, was taught how to don full Ebola, bar The Mask, (which happened last week). Great. But now, it's basically a bin liner and a paper towel. That, apparently, is now fine. Like we believe, for one second, that epidemiology has decreed it. Rather than The Trust has run out of stock.
In the lead up to the virus hitting the UK myself, my fellow nursing staff and the medical team were trained and tested in all the PPE, Management made a huge song and dance about it, chasing after us telling us how imperative it was that we were all trained, getting male staff to shave off their beards so the vital masks would fit correctly etc etc
But now - suddenly the PPE is no longer required and an apron, a papery mask and a visor that is to be wiped down between patients, is more than enough to keep us safe.
We aren’t allowed to carry the alcoholic hand gels on our person anymore either because we have been told there isn’t enough stock for staff to have an individual bottle each.
It just feels like nobody cares if we are protected or not and that we are being fobbed off and lied to in order to keep us in line. Morale is so low and there’s just no faith in Management anymore, we don’t feel like we are all equal parts of a team - instead we feel like there is some big conspiracy going on behind our backs and they we are just seen as collateral damage.