The late Mr Gibson and his daughter Doctor Gardner: she’s taking Matt Hancock to court and he may have met his match.
This is what happens when government policy on Covid-19 cases causes the death of someone related to a doctor.
Cathy Gardner launched a high court claim on Friday (June 12) after her father, Michael Gibson, a retired superintendent of births, marriages and deaths, died in an Oxfordshire care home in early April.
He became infected after a patient who tested positive for the virus was discharged from hospital into the home.
It was Tory policy to send infected care home residents back to their homes, where they would be able to infect other residents in a closed system that meant the virus could spread like wildfire.
They also took no precautions to prevent staff who travelled between homes from spreading the disease from one facility to another.
The request for a judicial review alleges failings “have led to large numbers of unnecessary deaths and serious illnesses” and have been “aggravated by the making of wholly disingenuous, misleading and – in some cases – plainly false statements suggesting that everything necessary has been done to protect care homes during the pandemic”.
Several [families of care home residents] have raised complaints with hospitals and care homes about infection control, including the discharging of Covid-negative residents into homes with outbreaks.
Thirty-five councils have also blamed virus spread on discharges with hospital patients sent to homes that did not have sufficient protective equipment and/or facilities to isolate infected residents.
Other cases include a decision to discharge John Heywood, 83, from Addenbrooke’s hospital in Cambridge into a Peterborough care facility with an outbreak. He contracted the virus and survived, but his family have lodged a formal complaint with Addenbrooke’s.
Wasn’t Addenbrooke’s the site of a PR stunt by Boris Johnson in the run-up to the general election last year? Yes – he was booed out of it. No doubt hospital chiefs will be delighted to have yet another reason to resent Johnson’s presence in Downing Street.
Neither the Department of Health and Social Care nor NHS England are commenting on the case while it is ongoing.
But we’re going to have to keep a close eye on it.
Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.
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