The daughter of a West Belfast couple who died after testing positive for Covid-19 has urged the public to “take this seriously” as she grieves the loss of her parents.
Christopher Vallely, 79, and his wife Isobel 77, died within 12 hours of each other at the Mater Hospital in North Belfast, sending shockwaves through their community.
Speaking to BBC Talkback on Monday, Fiona Vallely pleaded with the public to follow all social distancing guidelines.
She said: “Please, please, please everybody, please follow the public guidelines, do everything you can to protect yourself and your families because this is only going to get worse. We have seen first hand what this can do.
“They both had underlying health issues, my dad was never going to fight terminal cancer, but my mum fought back, from six months ago, a stroke and all her other illnesses, but they both couldn’t fight this illness, so that shows how this is a very, very serious illness.”
Mr Vallely, who was known as Arty, was taken to the Royal Victoria Hospital 10 days ago, before being transferred to the Mater Hospital after testing positive for Coronavirus.
Isobel was taken directly to the North Belfast hospital after showing symptoms of Covid-19 last Thursday. The pair were brought together in a shared room.
And in the hours before they died, staff at the Mater allowed Arty and Isobel’s children into their room, providing them with protective clothing and masks to say final goodbyes.
Fiona paid tribute to the hospital staff: “I was very, very grateful that they let us do that under the circumstances because I know a lot of families haven’t had that chance. We would like to think they were conscious and could hear us.
“We’re not going to give them the proper send-off that they both absolutely deserve. My dad is getting cremated because that was his wish, and my mum’s wishes were to be buried.
“It’ll be two separate, and it’s going to be hard. We were hoping to have a lovely church service for mum with all of her friends and family.
“And for my dad we were going to have a big party because he had such a zest for life.
“Yes, they were 79 and 77, but they were both so young at heart and young in their heads and had so much life still to live.”
St Paul’s parish priest Fr Tony Devlin told The Irish News: “They were a lovely wee couple and lived their lives to look after each other.
“They loved their family and their family loved them and they were very close knit.”
