Healthcare workers suing NHS bodies over Covid infections from ‘inadequate’ PPE

By Jess Glass, Reporter7th March 2024News EnglandCoronavirus / Covid-19, Courts / Justice, News England, NHS, Nursing / Midwifery, Workforce

Dozens of healthcare workers are bringing legal action against the NHS, claiming they were provided with “inadequate” PPE and contracted Covid-19 while treating patients, the High Court has heard.

The cohort of more than 60 doctors, nurses, paramedics, healthcare assistants and care workers facing “significant symptoms” of the virus, including long Covid, are suing bodies including NHS trusts.

At a preliminary hearing on Wednesday, a judge was told the healthcare workers argue it was not reasonable for their employers to consider surgical facemasks “adequate protection” against Covid-19.

Their barrister, Charles Woodhouse KC, told the High Court in London: “These claimants are all ill. Some of them have died. Most of them are unable to work because of their ongoing symptoms.

“Some of them who are unable to work are about to have their employment contracts terminated.”

The barrister alleged that before the pandemic, it was known that appropriate PPE for a novel coronavirus-type outbreak would include an FFP3 type mask.

Mr Woodhouse continued: “That advice was changed as a matter of political expediency and it was negligent to do so.”

Lawyers on behalf of the English NHS bodies in the claim told the court the cases were in their early stages, and it had not been made clear when the employers were said to have known surgical masks were not suitable.

Barrister Cara Guthrie said the parties did not have the “basic relevant information” needed to progress the claims.

She said in written submissions: “The service of [the] claimants during the Covid pandemic is recognised and, on behalf of NHS Defendants in England, we pay tribute to those claimants who have suffered illness.”

The barrister added: “The type of clinical setting will be relevant to the extent of the risk of acquiring Covid and therefore the suitability of the PPE provided and to the feasibility of ventilation.”

The court heard this legal action is likely to be joined with a group of around 300 others also bringing claims against NHS bodies in England and Wales in “similar circumstances”.

Judge David Cook said: “It seems essential to me that if all of these claims are coming before the court they are put together and dealt with in a coordinated way.”

The next hearing in the claims is now expected in October.