Racism more common in Harrogate than many think, says hospital chief executive

The man in charge of Harrogate District Hospital has said racist abuse isn’t as uncommon in the town as many people think.

Steve Russell, chief executive of Harrogate and District NHS Foundation Trust, was abused in the town centre following England’s 2-0 defeat of Germany on Tuesday.

A woman told him she was “proud to be white and British because we’re better than people like you”.

Mr Russell, who was born in Leeds, grew up in Sheffield and lived in London before moving to Harrogate, said he didn’t think racism was any more prevalent here than other places he lived but added:

“There’s probably a perception that stuff like this doesn’t happen in Harrogate because it’s a nice place, but it does.

“The reason I tweeted about it is because sadly this is something that happens more frequently than people think.

“People have been very kind in their comments in response to what happened. But many were surprised it happened and I’m not. If you talk to other people from ethnic minorities they probably wouldn’t be surprised either.”

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Mr Russell, who is in charge of more than 2,000 staff at the trust, was born in the United Kingdom to parents from India and was then adopted.

He said he was “as British as anyone else” but nevertheless experienced childhood racism frequently and although it became less common during his university years and beyond things had “got worse in recent years”.

Racism needs “calling out”

Asked what could be done to prevent it, he said it required people to be “good allies” and to call out racism while not putting themselves at risk of attack.

He admits he was more shaken than he realised by Tuesday’s incident, which happened close to the Odeon cinema. He recalls:

“I was walking home, minding my own business. There were lots of people in town celebrating, which was lovely.

“The woman said it to me just as I was walking past.

“In the moment I was just taken aback. I just put my head down and speeded up walking. It was only when I got in my flat I realised I was quite shaken by it.”

Mr Russell’s tweet has received almost 4,000 likes and has been shared a thousand times. He said:

“I’m really surprised by the number of people who have interacted with it. My tweets are not normally very exciting. They’re usually about what great work my team have done or about my cat!”

Nice. Just walked home in Harrogate. People celebrating the #EnglandvGermany win and a woman slurred ‘I’m proud to be white and British because we’re better than people like you’ at me.

Charming.

— #hellomynameis Steve (he/him) 💙 (@steve_r76) June 29, 2021

75 covid cases in Harrogate district but hospitalisations fall

Another 75 covid infections have been recorded in the Harrogate district in the past 24 hours, according to Public Health England.

It is almost double yesterday’s figure of 42 and is the highest daily figure since January 13, when there were 86 infections.

However, separate figures released today by NHS England show the spike in infections is not leading to an increase in hospitalisations. There are currently two covid patients at Harrogate District Hospital – down from three last week, which suggests the vaccination programme is working.

The Harrogate district data reflects the national picture where cases have risen by almost 70% in a week but deaths have increased by just 11% and hospitalisations by 6%.

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The current seven-day rate of infection in the district is 173, slightly above the England rate of 172.

There have been no further covid-related deaths at Harrogate District Hospital. It means the death toll remains at 179.

Number of covid patients at Harrogate hospital falls to two

The number of covid patients at Harrogate District Hospital has fallen to two, despite a sharp rise in infections in the district.

In a sign that the vaccination programme is working, Amanda Bloor, accountable officer for NHS North Yorkshire Clinical Commissioning Group told North Yorkshire Local Resilience Forum today there are now fewer covid patients at the hospital than last week, when there were three.

The number of cases of the Delta variant in the Harrogate district has nearly quadrupled in the last two weeks. The district’s seven-day rate of infection is now 155 per 100,000, just below the England average of 159.

Despite the steep rise, the hospital has not faced the same pressures as in previous waves. At the peak in February, there were 68 covid patients at Harrogate hospital.

According to the latest NHS England figures, the hospital’s last covid-related death was reported on April 11.

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Ms Bloor also said today that Ripon racecourse vaccination site, which opened in February, is due to close in August.

The closure of the Great Yorkshire Showground vaccination centre in Harrogate this month has seen many people travel to Leeds, York or Bradford for jabs, although there are pharmacy sites in Knaresborough and Pateley Bridge.

Ms Bloor said pop-up vaccination sites could open in the district this year.

She said:

“We want to be able to flex the programme as sites and vaccines allow.”

Harrogate hospital chief executive racially abused by England fan

The man in charge of Harrogate District Hospital has been racially abused by England fans on his way home tonight.

Steve Russell, chief executive of Harrogate and District NHS Foundation Trust, tweeted about the incident shortly after England’s 2-0 win over Germany.

He said that a woman shouted “I’m proud to be white and British because we’re better than people like you”.

Mr Russell is in charge of more than 2,000 staff who have been at the forefront of the fight against covid in the district over the past 15 months.

He has spoken about racism encountered in previous interviews, saying he had been told to “get back in my banana boat” while at school.

He has also said BAME colleagues deserve to be treated better.

Mr Russell’s tweet to his almost 4,500 followers prompted an avalanche of supportive responses.

One said the comment was “utterly vile”, another said “awful and just plain old barbaric” while another person said he hoped Mr Russell pointed out that most of England’s goals have been scored by Jamaican-born Raheem Sterling.

Nice. Just walked home in Harrogate. People celebrating the #EnglandvGermany win and a woman slurred ‘I’m proud to be white and British because we’re better than people like you’ at me.

Charming.

— #hellomynameis Steve (he/him) 💙 (@steve_r76) June 29, 2021

 

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TV star Nick Knowles hails jailing of Harrogate hospital bike thieves

TV presenter Nick Knowles has hailed the news that thieves have been jailed for stealing bicycles belonging to NHS staff at Harrogate District Hospital.

Mr Knowles, who stars in DIY SOS, offered to buy a new bike for Naresh Gnanasekaran, a doctor at the hospital whose bike was stolen during the first wave of covid in April last year.

Halfords eventually agreed to give Dr Gnanasekaran a new electric bike for free.

Last week John Roddy, 24, from Headingley, Leeds and his partner-in-crime, who could be named for legal reasons, were jailed for stealing bikes worth almost £7,000 from 11 NHS workers in Harrogate and Leeds.

The court heard Roddy had battled drug addiction.

Most of the thefts occurred outside Harrogate District Hospital when staff were having to deal with huge workloads due to the pandemic, said prosecutor Chris Moran.

Mr Moran said one NHS worker in Harrogate had been so “damaged” by the theft of her £400 bike she no longer cycled to work.

Michael Smith, a consultant at the hospital, tagged Mr Knowles in a tweet that contained a link to the Stray Ferret article about the two men being jailed.

Mr Knowles replied that he was glad the men were caught and thankful to the NHS for their efforts over the last 18 months.

I do
Glad your guy got his bike replaced
Glad they were caught
Sad what drugs do to peoples lives and judgement
Thanks to all your colleagues for all you e done over the last 18 months

— Nick Knowles (@MrNickKnowles) June 25, 2021

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Harrogate Hospital Radio wins three-year fight for FM licence

Harrogate Hospital Radio is preparing to go on to the FM airwaves after earning a licence on its third attempt in three years.

It will be a major step for the station when it starts to broadcast for the first time on 95.3FM from 9am on September 1.

The charity radio station, which has been keeping hospital staff and patients entertained since October 1977, has had a long journey to get to this point.

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Mark Oldfield, Harrogate Hospital Radio’s chairman, was knocked back by regulator Ofcom twice, but took the loss of Stray FM as a reason to take up the fight again.

He started a petition to drum up support, which was signed by nearly 400 people, and said:

“I can’t begin to tell you what this means to Harrogate Hospital Radio. An awful lot of hard work has gone into our submission.

“I’d like to thank MP Andrew Jones and Harrogate Hospital Radio NHS Trust chair Angela Schofield, and its chief executive, Steve Russell, for their support.

“Early this year, I was invited to resubmit my application and, finally, at the end of May, I got a call from Ofcom to inform me my application had been successful.

Harrogate District Hospital now has 300 FM radios so even more patients will be able to listen to Harrogate Hospital Radio.

The chairman hopes that it will become the dedicated radio station for not only the hospital, but the surrounding area as well.

Thieves who stole NHS workers’ bikes at Harrogate hospital jailed

Two prolific thieves who stole thousands of pounds worth of bikes from NHS workers in Harrogate at the height of the covid pandemic have been jailed for a combined eight years.

John Roddy and his partner-in-crime, who cannot be named for legal reasons at this stage, stole the bicycles from outside hospitals in Harrogate and York between May and October last year.

Just under £7,000 of bikes were stolen from 11 victims, many of whom were working flat out for the NHS during the covid crisis, York Crown Court heard.

Most of the thefts occurred outside Harrogate District Hospital when staff were having to deal with huge workloads due to the pandemic, said prosecutor Chris Moran.

Mr Moran said one NHS worker in Harrogate had been so “damaged” by the theft of her £400 bike that she no longer cycled to work.

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Other hospital workers had been left “extremely distressed” by the incidents at a time of national emergency. 

Two of the thefts occurred outside York District Hospital, when Roddy and his sidekick, both drug addicts, stole bikes worth over £1,000.

Some of the bikes stolen from Harrogate were worth over £1,000 and had been locked, but the thieves are thought to have used cutting equipment. One of the bikes was valued at £2,000.

Mr Moran said:

“These victims were extremely distressed given that they were NHS workers.

“One woman said she didn’t even cycle to work anymore. This was targeting of NHS staff at the height of the pandemic.”

12-hour shifts

The Harrogate woman had been working 12-hour shifts and was “emotionally and physically drained” after working flat out for half a day when she found her bike had been stolen from outside the hospital.  

Roddy, 24, and his cohort, a 33-year-old man from Leeds, appeared for sentence on Thursday after each pleaded guilty to 11 counts of theft.  

Roddy’s co-accused was also sentenced for handling thousands of pounds worth of stolen goods in a separate incident in 2018 and another theft in April 2020.

All but nine of the bike thefts occurred at hospitals. Two other bicycles were stolen outside a supermarket and a bakery. 

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The court heard that Roddy, from Headingley, Leeds, had nine previous convictions for offences including vehicle and bike thefts and was subject to a court order at the time he targeted the hospitals in Harrogate and York. His partner-in-crime had a worse criminal record, which included “numerous” thefts and burglaries. 

Kristian Kavanagh, for Roddy, said his client had battled drug addiction.

Sarah Barlow, for Roddy’s co-defendant, said her client also had a long-standing drug habit. 

Judge Simon Hickey said: 

“This was targeted criminality of high-value items that were particularly cared for by NHS workers in the main (when they) were working their shifts.

“Both of you were stealing over a period of five months (and) the victims lost just short of £7,000 of goods.”

He said that “numerous victims” had been highly distressed by the thefts and the woman who had been working 12-hour shifts was now “damaged”.

Roddy, who skipped bail following the offences, was jailed for three years and one month. His co-defendant was jailed for five years.

Harrogate hospital emergency department treating ‘unsustainable’ patient numbers

A senior consultant at Harrogate District Hospital has urged people not to visit the emergency department unless necessary due to an ‘unprecedented’ number of patients.

Dr Helen Law, a consultant in emergency medicine, spoke after figures revealed the number of people seeking treatment had risen by 23 per cent compared with two years ago.

Over seven days from June 1 this year, 1,115 patients attended the emergency department compared with 939 patients during the same period in 2019, pre-covid.

The figures were released by West Yorkshire Association of Acute Trusts, which represents six NHS trusts in Yorkshire. The six trusts together have seen an average rise in the number of emergency patients over the same period of 17%.

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Dr Law said:

“We are seeing unprecedented numbers of people seeking treatment at our hospital and I know the situation is the same across West Yorkshire.

“We are highlighting this because at the current rate it is simply not sustainable to treat this many people on any long-term basis.

“Emergency departments are seeing significant numbers of patients seeking treatment for issues that are non-emergencies.

“Everyone in the NHS is here because we want to make people better and no one would ever say, ‘Don’t come to hospital’.

“But I would urge anyone planning on coming to the emergency department to ask themselves: ‘Is this an emergency?'”

The increase in patients is not believed to be linked to coronavirus.

The number of covid patients has remained low at Harrogate District Hospital over summer and currently number just three.

Number of covid patients in North Yorkshire hospitals almost doubles in a week

The number of covid patients in North Yorkshire’s hospitals has almost doubled in the last week.

Senior health officials are urging people to continue to get the vaccine as cases in the county continue to surge.

Amanda Bloor, accountable officer for NHS North Yorkshire Clinical Commissioning Group told a meeting of North Yorkshire’s Local Resilience Forum today that there had been a jump in the number of patients in the last seven days.

She said: 

“We have seen that the number of patients who have covid in our hospitals has risen over the last week.

“As of yesterday there were 23 patients in our hospitals and that figure is up from 12 this time last week so we have seen an increase of 11 patients.”

The numbers include six patients in York Hospital and three in Harrogate. There are currently no covid patients at Scarborough Hospital.

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The rise in patients comes as the Delta variant of covid continues to spread throughout North Yorkshire, particularly in those under 30, with the number of cases having tripled in a fortnight.

The current infection rates per 100,000 in the county are 139 in Selby, 124 in Craven, 108 in Richmondshire, 91 in Harrogate, 51 in Ryedale, 44 in Hambleton and 28 in Scarborough.

The overall rate for North Yorkshire is now 81. At the start of June, the county’s rate per 100,000 people was just 18.

Mrs Bloor said everyone who was eligible for a vaccine, which is now all over 18s, should come forward to get the jab.

She said: 

“We all know how important vaccination is.

“Anything that all of us can do to encourage any of our friends, colleagues, families and people in our communities who have not felt able to come forward yet and take their vaccine [will help].

“We can see from the numbers in our communities and from the numbers of patients in hospitals that the most effective weapon against covid is to have a vaccine and have two doses.

“It may not prevent you from getting the disease itself but it will prevent you from becoming seriously unwell and potentially requiring hospital treatment and stay in hospital.”

Mrs Bloor added that “there was still a link” between the rise in infections and hospitalisations and it had not yet been broken.

So far, 355,012 people have had two doses of a covid vaccine in North Yorkshire according to Public Health England figures.

Harrogate district covid infections hit four-month high

The Harrogate district has recorded the highest daily number of covid infections for four months.

Today’s 29 cases is the highest since February 17 when 31 infections were recorded, according to Public Health England statistics.

But no covid-related deaths have been reported at Harrogate District Hospital since April 11.

According to NHS England statistics, the death toll at the hospital remains at 179.

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Elsewhere, the district’s seven-day covid rate is marginally up to 59 cases per 100,000 people.

The North Yorkshire average is 45 and the England average is 75.

According to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, the Delta variant is now the dominant strain of coronavirus in North Yorkshire and most cases are among under 30-year-olds.

Louise Wallace told a North Yorkshire Local Resilience Forum briefing today that the variant – which was first identified in India and has delayed the final lifting of lockdown restrictions – was accelerating in most parts of the county at a rate of around 40 new cases per day.

She added the strain appeared to be spreading fastest amongst young people, who she  urged to take vaccines. Jabs are now available to over 21-year-olds.

Ms Wallace said:

“The Delta variant does appear – as is the case nationally – to be the dominant strain of covid across North Yorkshire.

“In light of that, it is really important that given the variant is more transmissible we don’t let our guard down.”