Why wouldn’t the Chief Nurse confirm how many NHS staff have died?

[Skybluepink123]

I’ve just been watching today’s press briefing and don’t understand why Ruth May refused to confirm how many NHS staff had died from Covid?
She cited a lack of family consent which prevented her from talking about individuals but that wasn’t the information that the reporter sought. Also, I’m cross that she started her speech by acknowledging her happiness that the PM was getting better but failed to acknowledge the near 1000 families who are grieving today.
One more (trivial) thing. How comes she’s managed a hair cut in between press briefings?

Perhaps she didn't think the rest of the NHS staff would feel better for hearing it?

She either doesn't know, or doesn't want frontline staff to panic.

Maybe she didn’t know the total for all NHS staff.

because some of the families have not given permission

Most likely she doesn’t know. Real time figures are not an NHS strong point.

Probably because we don't know, as staff are not being screened.

And only deaths in hospital are recorded.

I think it’s an important question to have an accurate answer to. We’re asking a lot of frontline staff and she steered away from answering.

The NHS staff will know if she's lying or not, they are the ones dealing with a lack of PPE

And whilst it's good the pm isn't getting worse, he isn't any more important than anyone else and I for one am sick of the fawning he's been getting over this. I hope everyone gets better, not just him.

Hear hear ssd

How come she always appears in uniform? I suspect she hasn't nursed on a ward for quite some years.

She doesn't know. Just like that fucker whose name I can't remember said the other day "four doctors and some nurses have died". He didn't know how many nurses either. I bet there are lots of care workers who aren't worth counting either

Matt Hancock, that's his name.

Why not admit you don’t know if indeed you don’t? No shame in that (?) NHS staff broad term & admit, sensitively, don’t have immediate numbers?

She seemed to be suggest breach of privacy to give even anonymised numbers out?

There seems to be a lack of transparency across the board.

It’s not a conspiracy

Not every family will allow for their loved ones who have died names to be made public which is completely understandable

I’m well aware of the issues around PPE

Let’s not make this into some sort of conspiracy it’s distasteful to imply that theu are hiding numbers. NHS UK has around 1.5 million employees separated into different trusts we are not aware of David or Angela in Newcastle down in London just because we work for the NHS

They don’t want us to know how many NHS workers have died because they are already under scrutiny for the lack of PPE

Confidentiality and Consent would prevent her giving out names, not numbers.

She doesn't know, and/or she's been told not to frighten the cannon fodder.

I don’t know why she didn’t answer but the number of positive results from the NHS swab tests are shocking, from approx 9,000 tests, over 3,000 were positive!

As well as a refusal to give that figure, aren't ordinary NHS staff being prevented from commenting on coronavirus? Concerning.

They don't need to release names so there isn't a privacy/family permission issue. They had no problem counting the doctors who have died a few days ago; they haven't counted nurses/care workers either because they can't be bothered or because there are too many to count easily.

@MrsWhites. But haven't the one they have been testing been the ones with symptoms?

The way the press works if she said 10 doctors and 20 nurses the gutter press wouldn't rest until they had named them all.

It's only recently that they have started giving out figures in Scotland for each individual NHS region for exactly the same reason. And don't give them out for council areas.

It is not a breach of privacy to give numbers out, as there is nothing identifying in that.

@ssd he kinda is though... big picture thinking, it doesnt matter nearly as much if i die, or my DH, as it does if the man leading the country dies. His life doesnt have more moral value than anyone else's, but practically speaking it is much more important than the milkman's.

What has family consent got to do with it? No one has to give consent to be counted in medical statistics.

It's possible that the data doesn't exist get, just getting consistent numbers of deaths is hard enough without recording their occupations I'd think, imo there are a lot of people with unrealistic expectations about what can be done in the throes of a crisis.

Would knowing the answer help save any lives? Unless the answer is yes I'd rather resources are used to do that.

It’s really odd when non clinical nurses insist on wearing uniforms. It’s some random uniform too.