PPE supplies will allow care home staff to hold party for veterans to mark 75th VE Day anniversary

They are the last of the valiant who fought for our freedom. But yesterday it was their turn to salute a new generation of heroes.

After weeks of being confined to their rooms in a home, a group of veterans can now celebrate VE Day together with their carers – thanks to Mail Force and the generosity of Daily Mail readers. 

Vital protective kit supplied by the new charity will allow staff to safely put on a party on Friday to mark the 75th anniversary of the victory in Europe. 

The veterans were particularly elated because it could be the last major anniversary of VE Day that they are part of. 

They include 98-year-old Jim Hooper, a former staff sergeant in the Glider Pilot Regiment, who feared he would have to remember fallen comrades on his own in his room. 

Mr Hooper, who fought in the Battle of Arnhem, said: ‘This really is first class. I’m very grateful to everyone who has donated money and all the efforts to get the equipment here.’ 

Mail Force – launched last week by the Mail and its partners to tackle the PPE shortage – is attracting an extraordinary response from the public. 

Contributions from Mail readers sailed past the £500,000 mark while philanthropist Sir Tom Hunter donated £100,000, taking the total raised to an incredible £5.1million. 

In other developments yesterday: 

• The UK death toll rose by 315 to 28,446, just below Italy’s total;
• Boris Johnson revealed his doctors had been prepared to announce his death and said at one point he ‘couldn’t see a way out’; 
• A new app to trace the ‘contacts’ of patients infected with coronavirus will be trialled on the Isle of Wight; 
• Key worker parents were urged to send their children to school over concerns that just 2 per cent are in the classroom; 
• A minister admitted more lives could have been saved if Britain had had greater testing capacity earlier in the crisis. 

Mr Hooper, a father-of-three who lost his sight in 2013, and about 20 other veterans will honour the fallen at the special VE Day lunch. 

Surrounded by bunting, they will eat sandwiches and sponge cake, and then sing Vera Lynn’s most memorable songs. The care home in Brighton is run by Blind Veterans UK, a charity which supports former servicemen and woman who have lost their sight. 

Residents will receive a personal message from Sophie, Countess of Wessex, the charity’s patron, on Friday. 

‘We now have effective protection from the coronavirus and I’m really looking forward to the occasion,’ Mr Hooper said. ‘I just hope I remember the words. I might even treat myself to a glass of wine. 

‘The Battle of Arnhem was a calamity. Most of the division got wiped out. I’ve attended a great many remembrance services in Arnhem and this time those that died will be remembered at this home.’ 

Mr Hooper was one of the 35,000 troops who landed in occupied Holland in what was then the largest airborne operation in history. He landed a large gilder – carrying 28 soldiers and weapons – 60 miles behind enemy lines in September 1944. 

He fought for two days as an infantryman before becoming one of 6,500 Allied soldiers to be captured. Mr Hooper spent four months in a prisoner-of-war camp in Poland before being ordered to march west to a camp in the German city of Luckenwalde. Three months later, he escaped. 

After the death of his wife Ann, he moved into the care home in 2018 and has enjoyed the camaraderie of fellow veterans. Since the outbreak, four of the 32 residents at Mr Hooper’s home have died and six are in isolation after testing positive for coronavirus. 

Staff say the residents did not catch the virus in the home and have put stringent infection control measures in place to protect colleagues and other veterans. 

Like many other care homes across the UK, the centre’s efforts to protect its residents has left it perilously short of PPE. Staff had three gowns left when Mail Force arrived with a consignment of bodysuits and masks on Saturday. 

Without the new PPE, carers would not be able to move safely between the isolated residents who have Covid-19 and those who are allowed out of their rooms for Friday’s party. 

Lesley Garven, manager of the home, said: ‘We’re extraordinarily grateful for the donation from Mail Force. It’s made us breathe a sigh of relief. 

‘For VE Day, like other days, we will be constantly having to change masks and aprons. But now we know that we have the rigorous protection that we need for our members who may have Covid-19… so a big thank you.’ 

After the first veteran contracted the virus in hospital, staff at the home had to work on the assumption that everyone else also had it, because they were unable to get everyone tested. 

But this changed after the Government rolled out coronavirus testing facilities to all care home residents and staff. 

Mrs Garven added: ‘It’s been very difficult to know if we had contagion within the centre because we haven’t had testing. For weeks we had no idea who had it and who did not. 

‘It was an absolute nightmare and very difficult to manage.’ 

Despite the new extra supply of PPE, Mrs Garven said staff were taking no chances and will make sure residents are a safe distance from each other during the party. 

Mail Force’s campaign began in earnest only last Tuesday night, when it flew an airliner packed with 20 tons of personal protective equipment from Shanghai to London. 

The £1million cargo filled the hold and cabin of the chartered airliner. The 50,000 medical coveralls and 100,000 masks quickly cleared customs and went straight to an NHS distribution centre in the Midlands. 

After further checks, the first consignments were despatched to a hospital, an ambulance trust, a hospice and three care homes. 

Thanks to the speed and scale of public support for Mail Force, plans are under way to bring in further airlifts of PPE. 

Last night Cabinet Office Minister Michael Gove said the Government was increasing the supply of PPE to key workers.

£500,000! Big-hearted Mail readers dig deep for PPE charity 

By Mario Ledwith for the Daily Mail 

Donations from Daily Mail readers to a new fund to supply NHS and care staff with lifesaving equipment soared beyond £500,000 last night. 

More than 13,000 generous readers pledged money for the essential kit needed by frontline staff to tackle the coronavirus epidemic. 

The astonishing sum was donated in just five days after the launch of Mail Force, an independent charity created by the Mail and its partners. 

The flood of donations from both readers and public figures, such as the Duchess of Cornwall, took the fund to £5.1million last night. 

Scottish businessman and philanthropist, Sir Tom Hunter, pledged £100,000 to the campaign, which was created specifically to tackle PPE shortages in the UK. 

Actor Sir Michael Caine, 87, became the latest high-profile figure to back the campaign, thanking the charity for doing ‘a great job’. 

He said: ‘The job that you are doing at Mail Force is absolutely fabulous. It’s exactly the sort of thing we should be doing in this country and it brings so much security to our NHS.’ 

It came after the charity’s first consignment of personal protective equipment, weighing 20 tons and worth more than £1million, landed at Heathrow on Tuesday evening. 

Since being checked over, much of the cargo of 50,000 medical coveralls and 100,000 masks has already been dispatched to a hospital, an ambulance trust, care homes and a hospice. 

By last night, more than 13,000 readers had donated more than £540,000 on the charity’s online fundraising page.

The total was reached just hours after Sir Brian Souter, the founder of transport firm Stagecoach, said he would match donations from readers up to £500,000. 

One donating reader, Eric Gardner, wrote: ‘For the NHS and the nurses and doctors, with thanks for all they do.’ 

Lynne wrote: ‘We must all do our bit in these dreadfully frightening times. We need these dedicated people more than ever right now and I hope this helps in some way.’ 

Mail Force has also received 1,100 cheques in the post, while contributions from private benefactors and our partners have reached £4.16million. 

Every donation, no matter how small, will be used to arrange for thousands more pieces of equipment to be airlifted to the UK for care staff as the coronavirus crisis continues. 

If there is any money left over, the charity will use it to support the NHS and care workers in the best ways it can. 

The Duchess of Cornwall joined two former prime ministers, Gordon Brown and Sir John Major, in backing the campaign last week. 

Camilla, who has rallied behind NHS workers since her husband Prince Charles was diagnosed with Covid-19, described Mail Force as a ‘magnificent campaign’.

The Daily Mail, whose proprietor is Viscount Rothermere, has provided £1million to the campaign. The Rothermere Foundation has given a further £150,000, while the Rothermere/Harmsworth family has donated £100,000. 

Billionaire philanthropists Hans and Julia Rausing have donated £1million. Mr Rausing, 56, whose grandfather founded the food packaging firm Tetra Pak, and his wife Julia, have pledged £16.5million to more than 50 causes fighting coronavirus. 

Tory grandee Michael Spencer donated £250,000 to Mail Force, describing the campaign to supply frontline staff with protective gear as ‘a hugely important issue’.