Dominic Pimenta

Best for:
Those looking for some insight into the pandemic from the perspective of a health care worker.

In a nutshell:
Dr Dominic Pimenta, a cardiac registrar, tells the story of his experience working in hospital during the first wave of the COVID-19 Pandemic while starting up the HEROES charity to support healthcare workers.

Worth quoting:
N/A (Audio book)

Why I chose it:
I’ve followed Dr Pimenta on Twitter, and he’s shared some strong words about the UK Government’s failures during this response. Plus, as someone with a public health preparedness background, I wanted a bit more insight into whether it has been as bad as I think. (Spoiler: It’s worse.)

Review:
It’s hard to do a retrospective of a pandemic that is still very much widespread in many parts of the world, but this book does a great job of laying out how utterly wrong the UK government got in during the first wave, and pointing what will need to happen to avoid these failures going forward.

Dr Pimenta was working in cardiology earlier this year, eventually being transfered to provide support in intensive care units treating patients with COVID-19. In this book, after providing a bit of a biography, he shares his experience - day by day at the start, then week by week. He expresses his incredulity at how slowly the UK Government reacted despite evidence of what was happening in Italy. The UK was one of the last European country to lock down, likely costing thousands of lives. They also had policies like refusing to test people without travel history even after there was community spread.

But more than that, the UK government was responsible for so many cuts to the NHS over the years that it was just not resourced to respond to this pandemic. Two years ago there were as many as 100,000 unfilled posts. Hospitals were running at 95% capacity according to Dr Pimento, which meant very little wiggle room for something like this disease outbreak. Yes, it is great to have national healthcare (the US is still an utter shit show when it comes to health care), but one must actually FUND that healthcare to ensure it serves all who need it.

Dr Pimento also shares how he and his wife, who is also a doctor, and some friends and family decided they needed to do something, so they started the HEROES charity (now called Help Them Help Us: https://www.helpthemhelpus.co.uk/) to raise money to get PPE and other support, such as food delivery and mental health care for NHS workers. Something the government should have been handling, but yet again, a failure.

The book was hard to listen to at times, as all of this is so fresh, but it wasn’t as emotionally draining as it could have been. Two bits stand out as memorable: the detailed description of all the medical support needed for one ICU patient, and the first death from the disease that Dr Pimento is present for.

The audio book features a Q&A with the author at the end of every chapter, with Dr Pimenta being asked one or two questions relevant to what we’ve previously learned. I found that to be really helpful, especially as I often had the same question that was asked.

The second UK lock down is set to end in a few days. There are vaccines that are close to being available. But the UK government is still failing, making decisions based not on the science or what’s best for public health, but on their fears about the economy or worries about ruining Christmas. (Frankly, I think killing my relatives because we got to mix households over Christmas is a bigger way to ruin it than requiring we open gifts via Zoom, but then again I’m not Prime Minister so what do I know). It’s clear during this second wave that Boris and his friends just haven’t learned from the first wave, and that’s so deeply disappointing.

Keep it / Pass to a Friend / Donate it / Toss it:
Keep it… (plus d'informations)

Fascinating.
Dominic Pimenta was a cardiac surgeon in a busy London hospital when news of a new strain of a potentially deadly coronavirus started to filter through to him. The more he learned, the more concerned he became. He started to wear a mask for his tube journey in and out of work, but couldn't understand why the government was taking so little action.

This is a behind-the-scenes story of the build-up of Covid19, from a rumour coming out of China, to a deadly onslaught of the NHS in Britain. Dominic Pimenta was there, in the hospital, trying to spread the alarm. He was frustrated by the fact he couldn't test the early cases because the requirement for testing was that patients had to have travelled recently, or had contact with someone who had. These suspect patients went into the regular wards because there was no official reason to isolate them.

As the cases began to trickle in, gradually and then rapidly increasing in number, the medical staff began to struggle with shortage of protective equipment and eventually oxygen. Doctors and nurses were transferred from other wards, trained in emergency procedures and allocated to a Covid ward. As people stayed away from hospital for routine treatments, so more Covid wards were opened and more staff cross-trained. The work was grueling and continuous, but in spite of the toll it was having on staff, they kept going relentlessly. In the face of seemingly hopeless odds, several of the patients began to turn a corner and improve.

As time progressed it became more clear what would help the patients and what was less useful. A procedure called 'proning' appeared to be particularly effective. This involved turning patients at regular intervals, allowing the more functional parts of the lungs to access oxygen that was pooling elsewhere.

Throughout all this Mr Pimenta was not only working his shifts on the Covid wards but also building a charity. He and his medically trained wife wanted to provide food and drink for staff and psychiatric support for those that were struggling. As if that wasn't enough, his organisation started to procure the protective equipment that had been running short due to inadequate government response. He was even involved in starting up a 3D farm, manufacturing masks and protective eye coverings.

This is one incredible man who should be recognised in the honours lists, in my opinion.
He reads his own story but with humility. The only parts I was less keen on were the Q&A sessions, which interrupted the flow and didn't really add a lot.

For anyone who has lived through this and would be interested in knowing what was going on behind the scenes, this is a must-read.… (plus d'informations)