Appeal for community to send messages of thanks to Chichester hospital staff - 'Nurses would treasure these cards forever'

The Hug A Hospital (HAH) initiative was set up in March last year in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

With morale ‘at an all time low’ in the UK Covid-19 wards, HAH’S role of providing direct support has become ‘even more poignant’.

Dr Maggie Davies, chief nurse at St Richard’s Hospital, said: “We are so grateful to Hug A Hospital for all the wonderful donations Western Sussex Hospitals received during the first lockdown. The support we receive from the public means so much to our staff and we really do appreciate every message, picture and donation we receive.

“The past few weeks have been especially hard for all our hospital teams and it will be hugely uplifting for colleagues to receive personal messages of support in the form of a Hug-in-a-Card - in fact, it’ll give us all a real boost.”

In April, St Richard's staff were delivered gifts including Easter eggs and flowers thanks to financial donations from members of the public. Read more hereThe latest hug-in-a-card campaign aims to deliver handmade cards from the public, with a personal message of thanks inside to nurses working with COVID-19 patients across the UK.

A HAH spokesperson said: "The state of the country is understandably very different to March. The doctors and nurses are exhausted, many of them are off sick and they feel physically and mentally broken.

"Yet they still have to go in to work tomorrow, and the next day and the next day to care for our loved ones...and the crisis on the frontline is only going to get worse over the next few weeks."

Nicki Credland, chairman of the NHS British Association for Critical Care Nurses, said the nurses 'would treasure these cards forever'.

She added: "If I came off a 12 hour shift and there was a handmade card waiting for me made by a child or adult it would make such a difference to my morale."

Cards should include your own handmade illustration on the front and a personal message of thanks inside plus your name and age.

If you would like to take part, you are asked to place your homemade card, inside a plain, unsealed envelope. This should be placed inside another envelope and addressed to Hug A Hospital — PO Box 119, Haslemere, GU27 9HG.

You can follow HAH’s story on Instagram: @hugahospital or visit their website: www.hugahospital.org