Boris Johnson expressed his gratitude to several nurses in a video he posted when he left St Thomas’ Hospital in London on Easter Sunday but the two he picked out for special mention — Jenny McGee, 35, from New Zealand and Luis Pitarma, 29, from Portugal — have now had unsought international acclaim thrust on them.
In New Zealand, Tim Shadbolt, the mayor of Jenny’s home city, said: “It’s not very often a nurse from Invercargill saves the life of the British Prime Minister.”
And in Portugal, no less than the country’s President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa has commended his countryman with a statement on his official website: “The President of the Republic has already personally transmitted his gratitude to the nurse Luis Pitarma and in his name, he also thanks the commitment of all Portuguese health professionals who in Portugal and around the world are providing decisive help in the fight to the pandemic.”
On his way to Chequers, the Prime Minister’s 1,000-acre country retreat in Buckinghamshire, Boris stopped briefly at 10 Downing Street, to record a very emotional five-minute video, in which he began by admitting that “the NHS has saved my life, no question”.
He went on: “I want to pay my own thanks to the utterly brilliant doctors, leaders in their fields, men and women but several of them for some reason called Nick, who took some crucial decisions a few days ago for which I will be grateful for the rest of my life.
“I want to thank the many nurses, men and women, whose care has been so astonishing. I am going to forget some names, so forgive me, but I want to thank Po Ling and Shannon and Emily and Angel and Connie and Becky and Rachael and Nicky and Ann.
“And I hope they won’t mind if I mention in particular two nurses who stood by my bedside for 48 hours when things could have gone either way. They are Jenny from New Zealand — Invercargill on the South Island to be exact — and Luis from Portugal, near Porto.
“And the reason in the end my body did start to get enough oxygen was because for every second of the night they were watching and they were thinking and they were caring and making the interventions I needed.”
Jenny’s mother, Caroline McGee, told New Zealand TV: “It makes us feel exceptionally proud obviously. But she has told us these things over the years and it doesn’t matter what patient she is looking after, this is what she does.”
Jenny’s father, Mike McGhee, added: “I think over the years she has always told us that her job is one-on-one nursing with very critically ill people and that means she’s there all the time for 12 hours. We are all very proud of Jen, not just in the support she gave Boris but what she has been doing helping everyday people.