“SOMETIMES you feel like having a cry.”

“It is tough, I am not going to deny it.”

These are the words of a member of staff at a Romsey nursing home who has pleaded to residents to donate disposable gloves in an effort to battle coronavirus.

Fryers House, Botley Road, put out the appeal for help after discovering members of staff go through 5,000 pairs of gloves a week in order to care for 24 residents.

This comes as the Office for National Statistics revealed 145 care home residents died in cases involving COVID-19 in the Hampshire County Council area between Friday, April 10 and Friday, April 24.

The data also showed there were 3,096 deaths in care homes involving COVID-19 in England and Wales registered up to Friday April, 17.

Now care co-ordinator at Fryers House, Trish Moody, is appealing to the public to keep donating gloves, including masks, disposable aprons and shoe covers, fearing they will soon run out of these items.

Trish, who lives in Mercer Way, said: “My boss was tearing his hair out because we were struggling to buy any form of personal protective equipment (PPE), especially gloves.

“We go through 5,000 pairs of gloves a week because we have 70 members of staff and we work 24/7.

“Not only do we have nurses, we have support staff, a catering team and they all get PPE; we go and visit 24 residents and we have to change PPE every time.

“Obviously the NHS takes priority over us, but we have to get PPE because we have had residents with COVID-19 and some people have been in intensive care units.”

Hampshire Chronicle:

The 55-year-old added: “When you go to your normal company and say ‘I would like this’ and they cannot provide it for you it is because every other care home they provide for are fighting over the same thing.

“It is tough, I am not going to deny it. Sometimes you feel like having a cry, however the nurses and support staff are a fantastic team at Fryers House.”

The care co-ordinator added that since her and Owen Thomas, who volunteers at the nursing home, posted their call for help on Facebook the response “from the community has been absolutely fantastic”.

Trish said: “Frankie’s Fun Factory and Peter Symonds College in Winchester are some of the people who have helped us out.

“We have even got Romsey Area ScrubHub who are making scrubs and washing bags for the staff, so I would love to thank the community for coming together and helping us in our time of need.”

Commenting on the government’s response to coronavirus, Trish said: “If they watched China and saw it creeping across Europe then perhaps they should have done something earlier.

“We are here fighting it and working hard against it and you cannot change the past, so you have to get on with it because we do not have time to moan about it.”

A Department for Health and Social Care spokesperson said: "We want to be absolutely clear that no wholesaler has been asked to prioritise NHS provision over the care sector.

“The Government will continue to do everything it can to ensure social care workers get the support and equipment they need in response to this unprecedented pandemic.

“We have delivered more than 1 billion items of PPE to the frontline, including care homes, since this global outbreak began and have set up a dedicated phoneline for care homes to report any shortages.”

Fryer’s House put out their Facebook post on Tuesday, April 21.

To contact the nursing home call 01794 526 200.