God take me now I do not want to be here any more

Health worker destitute after the effects of coronavirus left her unable to work

- VIVIENNE AITKEN

NURSES suffering from long Covid have told how their lives and careers have been left in ruins after picking up the virus as they cared for others.

Brenda Eadie is now penniless after the condition stopped her working and revealed: "There are thousands of us with long Covid who have been left destitute - on our hands and knees begging for handouts.

"Sometimes, I find myself screaming, 'God just take me now, I don't want to be here any more." A nursing colleague of Brenda's, who asked not to be named, said without a financial miracle she is unlikely to see another Christmas.

She may have to sell her home because of the illness, which she caught at work.

Both women are backing a private members' Bill by Labour MSP Mark Griffin, which calls for essential workers who suffer long Covid to be classed as having an industrial injury if it was caught at work.

Brenda, 45, a former nurse at HMP Low Moss, in Bishopbriggs, near Glasgow, caught Covid in 2020.

She said: "I developed a shortness of breath and had to be taken to hospital by ambulance.

"I was on oxygen in hospital for two days and was then sent home with a nebuliser.

"I spent about a month in bed at home and lost whole days. My body was in pain, as if there was something sitting on it. My daughter had to help me go to the bathroom and get washed.

"When I was awake, I was finding it really hard to shake the brain fog."

Four weeks after returning to work, Brenda collapsed.

She said: "It was like a switch and my head flipped. Everything meshed into one background noise in my head and I couldn't make sense of what was going on."