The Prince of Wales suggested NHS staff should have enforced career breaks to aid their mental health, during a meeting to hear how health workers coped with the pandemic.
William visited the Oasis Health and Wellbeing Centre and garden at the Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading, which, five years ago to the day – March 5 – recorded the first person to die after testing positive for coronavirus.
The Prince of Wales talks to NHS staff in the health and wellbeing garden during a visit to the Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading (Richard Pohle/The Times/PA)
He chatted to staff from the Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust who were on the front line of the Covid-19 pandemic, and listened as one senior nurse became emotional when he described not visiting his elderly parents in Italy for two years to protect them during the outbreak.
The prince visited the Trust’s centre in his role as royal patron of NHS Charities Together which provided some of the £3 million needed to renovate the resource that has a gym, yoga classes and a garden providing spaces for recreation, reflection and vegetable growing.
William visited the Royal Berkshire Hospital to see the impact of funds provided by NHS Charities Together (Richard Pohle/The Times/PA)
William, a former air ambulance helicopter pilot, told a small group of NHS staff who use the facility: “Everyone in the NHS is there to care for others so the last person who gets looked after is the individual.
“I’ve seen that when I’ve worked with doctors, nurses, paramedics – they always put it down the line, they don’t want to put their workload on to someone else – how do you go around identifying the right people?
The Prince of Wales chatted to staff who were on the front line during the Covid-19 pandemic (Richard Pohle/The Times/PA)
“Because for me, looking into the nation’s mental health, if you like, over the last few years, unless there’s almost an enforced break in somebody’s career – as part of your career development – we’re never going to get to the point where we can look after their mental health, because you always rely on the individual to put their hand up.”
NHS Charities Together launched its Covid-19 Urgent Appeal in 2020 and raised £162 million to support NHS staff, patients and communities, working with a network of 235 NHS charities based in every Trust and Health Board around the UK.