| UPDATED: 15:19, Tue, Jan 12, 2021
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The coronavirus death toll is growing every day with the rate of coronavirus patients in hospitals jumping by 22 percent in just a week to its highest level ever. NHS England chief Sir Simon Stevens has warned the Covid crisis is now “out of control , and Health Secretary Matt Hancock today warned the new Covid-19 variant is putting the NHS under severe pressure. Mr Hancock warned Britons to stick to lockdown rules and said death rates remain “stubbornly high” but where in England has the worst
Maternity services are facing disruption across the South East because ambulance staff are too busy dealing with spiralling coronavirus hospitalisations.
The East Sussex NHS Trust and Brighton and Sussex NHS Trust have both suspended services for home-births and their stand-alone midwife-led units because they cannot guarantee an ambulance can turn up if there is an issue.
Four other trusts all in Kent, one of the places worst-hit by England s second wave have also paused their home-births service for the same reason.
It comes as hospital chiefs warn hundreds of intensive care patients may have to be moved between regions to take the pressure off the most over-stretched wards.
The Kent hospital trusts where over 40 percent of beds are occupied by COVID patients
Two trusts in the county had more than half of general and acute beds taken up by coronavirus patients
Updated
The Darent Valley Hospital (Image: Geograph)
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Janice Johnston often took a bath fully clothed, so that if she had the stroke she feared may be imminent, her dignity would be preserved in front of her children.
It was one of many desperate adjustments she made as she tried to come to terms with having a life-threatening blood cancer which also came with a much higher risk of fatal blood clots and strokes. For months, I honestly thought I could drop down dead at any moment, she says.
In a state of near permanent anxiety, the mother-of-four s fears about the future were compounded by the fact that, as time went on, the oral chemotherapy drugs she had been told she would need to take for the rest of her life were simply not working. Instead, she felt worse with every passing month.