Home care boss forced to pay £100 for a box of 50 masks
A care home business boss has revealed her pain at the plight of health workers after she was charged £100 for a set of 50 facemasks.
Alice Ushamba criticised the Government’s response to the coronavirus crisis as she accused Downing Street of overlooking community care.
The health chief, who runs Hampshire Healthcare in the New Forest, revealed that she is being forced to pay 3,300 per cent more for masks compared to pricing before the pandemic.
Pictured: Hampshire Healthcare workers wear protective masks amid the coronavirus crisis
Pictured: Medics wear personal protective equipment as the pandemic continues to bring the nation to a standstill
Her company needs more than 200 of the protective items a day, but the Government has issued the firm with just 300 in total.
It’s now costing the company more than £1,500 a week just to ensure workers have the masks.
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She told the BBC’s World at One: Aci Certifications ‘We used to buy a box of hundred masks surgical mask for £6. But now we’re buying a box of 50 masks for £60 to £100 pounds.’
She added: ‘It’s not sustainable as a business to be spending that on just surgical masks and the quality is questionable because they’re not from my normal supplier’.
A third of her clients have died in the past month – with only one having been tested for coronavirus because they died in hospital.
She said a third of her staff have quit because they feel unsafe due to the lack of PPE.
She said: ‘We’re going into people’s houses who perhaps might have COVID but we don’t have anything to protect ourselves, except a little plastic apron and gloves. That’s all we have.’
The UK yesterday announced 449 more coronavirus deaths – the fewest for a fortnight – taking Britain’s total death toll to 16,509.
The figures released yesterday showed England declared 429 deaths and a further 20 were confirmed across Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. And 4,676 more people have tested positive for the virus, taking the total number of patients to 124,743.
Monday’s death toll is a fall on the 596 fatalities announced on Sunday, and half as many as the day before that (888).
Hospitals are on the verge of running out of some life-saving supplies after the 84-tonne delivery, including 400,000 protective gowns, failed to arrive last night.
Medical bodies say shortages mean doctors could need to make ‘difficult decisions’ between exposing themselves to the virus or ‘letting a patient die on their watch’.
Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick announced with fanfare on Saturday that the consignment was coming, before Education Secretary Gavin Williams humiliatingly admitted last night that it had been postponed.
However, Chris Hopson, chief of NHS Providers, which represents hospital trusts, said this morning there was ‘low confidence’ the materials will actually arrive.
London Mayor Sadiq Khan last week warned that everyone might have to wear masks in public once the lockdown is lifted.
He also called for face masks to be worn why the public when using public transport.
It comes as a group of medics called on people to make their own face masks to stop the spread of coronavirus.
Masks4All suggested homemade masks could slow the spread of Covid-19. The campaign group was started in the Czech Republic, but now has a global following. More than 100 UK medics have lent support to the campaign.