North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust is marking one year since it first treated patients with coronavirus in our hospitals.

Reflecting on the pandemic a 5 minute video, ‘our covid story – one year on’, has been created to document and highlight the past 12 months. This follows on from the trust’s first instalment of its ‘our covid story’ which looked at the first few months of the pandemic in 2020.

In March 2020 the trust received its first positive coronavirus patients and ever since has been adapting, innovating and responding to the unknowns of the global pandemic.

Since March 2020, the trust has:

  • Carried out over 134,000 coronavirus tests, 19,000 antibody tests, 30,000 lateral flow tests and  20,000 coronavirus vaccinations.
  • Used over 2,763,598 items of PPE.
  • The highest number of coronavirus patients throughout the pandemic reached almost 300 during January.
  • Recruited 500 patients to take part in a coronavirus recovery trial.
  • So far 2510 babies have been born.
  • Received a staggering £61k of generous donations on its Just Giving page and “NHS Charities Together” donated £77k to benefit staff.

Lyn Simpson, Chief Executive at North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust said:

“It is quite hard to believe we’ve all been living through the coronavirus pandemic for a year now, it has been the most challenging time we have ever faced as an NHS.  We’ve all had to adapt and change the way we work and go about our daily business to manage and respond to the virus.

“It has been tough and the community and our staff have been impacted in different ways.  I am so proud of what we have achieved, everyone has pulled together and has shown immense strength whilst working around the clock to care for our patients.  We’ve also had fantastic support from our partners and the wider community.

“This video shares a small snapshot of our covid story so far as we move forwards with renewed hope and positivity.”