MANILA (UCAN): At least 29 Filipinos including 18 health workers are thought to have died in the United Kingdom (UK) while a number of others are in critical condition due to the Covid-19 coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2).
Some 21 were confirmed to have died from Covid-19 while the other eight are suspected to have succumbed to the disease, according to British media reports.
Public Health England, an executive agency of the UK’s health ministry, announced on April 21 that the country had 129,7044 confirmed cases of Covid-19 with 17,337 deaths. Over 397,000 thousand people have been tested.
Among the dead Filipinos, 18 worked in the National Health Service (NHS) as nurses, porters, healthcare assistants and care home staff.
Filipino health workers “form the backbone of Britain’s healthcare sector,” according to The Guardian newspaper.
The newspaper also claimed that Filipinos are the most numerous health workers in the UK after Britons and Indians, citing a 2019 House of Commons report saying that about 18,500 out of 200,000 Filipinos living in Britain are working in the country’s national health system.
Some Filipino workers, however, have raised concerns of being discriminated against and unprotected from the virus due to a shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE).
“It is breaking our hearts because we are talking about friends, family and close colleagues,” said Emily Barrameda, a Filipino overseas worker based in the UK.
She also claimed hospitals were prioritising British patients over Filipinos infected with the virus. “In some hospitals where there is a British person who is positive with Covid-19 and a Filipino one … it seems that they choose to prioritise the British one,” she said.
As we celebrate the 500 years of Christianity in the Philippines. The Chaplaincy to Filipino Migrants organises an on-line talk every Tuesday at 9.00pm. You can join us at:
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The Philippine ambassador to the UK, Antonio Lagdameo, said in a statement, “We are deeply saddened by reports of Filipino staff of the NHS who are either infected by Covid-19 or have succumbed to the disease. Our thoughts are with their loved ones.”
Lagdameo also described Filipino health workers’ contribution in the fight against the coronavirus in the UK as “nothing but immense.”
