Covid – a day of reflection

It’s being held at the new Trees of Life Glade at the National Memorial Arboretum at Alrewas in Staffordshire. 

It’s been created and planted specifically to remember the pandemic. The trees are young but you can easily imagine what it will look and feel like when spring, summer and autumn arrive.

Mark Ellis, the lead at the Arboretum, explained the importance of choosing the right trees: “We’re walking down an amalanchia walk here, these small trees on the either side of the pathway. And as we round the corner and the trees glade is in front of us, that magnificent space holder in the center of the of the planting there really does stand out with some colorful bedding plants around the bottom and all of those symbolism there’s they represent some of the stories the spade elder in particularly, makes us think of grief and loss, but also resilience and new hope and new life.”

The service will feature some of those stories, perhaps most notably from the former Children’s Laureate Michael Rosen. This time five years ago, he thought he had a bad bout of the flu. Within days, he was put into an induced coma for 40 days. He had a 50 per cent chance of survival.

He told Radio News Hub: “They thought that I was brain dead because my eye was dilated and not reacting to things coming in front of it, because I’d lost the sight in my eye and also the hearing in my left ear.

“Anyway, I wasn’t, but I wouldn’t wake up. I wouldn’t and couldn’t wake up. So in the end, what they did was call Emma in my wife, and she she held my hand. I was wheeled out onto the fourth floor atrium because it was during restrictions lockdown, and she held my hand and played recordings of our children in my ear. And apparently I reacted.”

Joining Michael at the service will be the opera singer Lesley Garratt, NHS doctors and nurses, key workers and many more who are still mourning the loss of loved ones, many of whom will have been unable to say goodbye in person or even attend funerals.

Without doubt, it will be an emotional and difficult day. The next few weeks, as we look back at those surreal times that we all shared – times that united us for a time in a way few would ever have predicted – will be poignant.

The Covid Inquiry is still going on. There remain many questions unanswered. Thousands of families are part of Covid Families for Justice, which was co-founded by Matthew Fowler. His voice cracked as he told us about the loss of his father, the man he still calls “very much my hero”:

“They gave us, I think it was about 48 hours. And sadly, he didn’t make that turnaround. They contacted us on the morning of the 13th of April and said that at this point there was nothing more they could do for him, that he was starting to have heart failure as well as kidney failure.”

“The reflection will be spent thinking about what I’ve lost. My dad was very much my hero.”