As the coronavirus pandemic continues, with astonishing daily death tolls and unrelentingly grim headlines, some are still managing to find hope in the gloom – from nonagenarians setting themselves physical feats to raise money for the NHS to Elvis impersonators lifting people’s spirits.
Capt Tom Moore inspires fundraising copycats
Capt Tom Moore’s now almost legendary fundraising effort, in which he raised more than £26.5m for the NHS by walking 100 laps of his garden, has inspired a string of copycats. Among them is 90-year-old Margaret Payne, who has set out to climb the equivalent of a Highland mountain by taking repeated trips up and down her stairs, and 91-year-old Welsh farmer Rhythwyn Evans, who is pledging to walk 91 laps around the exterior of his bungalow.
Ben, 11, from Lincoln has completed the National Three Peaks Challenge by climbing the equivalent of 3,408 metres – the combined height of Ben Nevis, Snowdon and Scafell Pike – in just over 17 hours on his stairs. He has raised more than £3,000 by going up and down his stairs 1,704 times, according to the BBC.
Six-year-old Hector Dee, from Wetherby in Yorkshire, is walking six miles in six days to raise money for frontline workers, while nine-year-old Amelia Davies from Leeds bounced on her trampoline for a total of 24-hours over the course of a weekend. She only took breaks to use the toilet, eat and sleep.
Former Scotland rugby captain Mike Biggar, from Wiltshire, has also set himself a challenge. The 70-year-old, who has used a wheelchair since a car accident in 1992 left him with brain damage, is attempting to walk 100 steps in 30 days, with the help of his bars, to raise money for the NHS. Fifty-nine-year-old Rudo Moyo, who lost his sight to measles at the age of four, is similarly walking 260 laps of his garden in Washington, Tyne and Wear, over 10 days.
Appearing on Good Morning Britain with his daughter on Monday morning, Tom Moore described the response to his fundraiser for the NHS as “rather like being in fairyland”. Hannah Ingram-Moore, said: “Our life has changed in the last five days. Every day something extraordinary happens … We simply remain a happy family and utterly humbled by the support of the public.”
Lockdown crooners cheer up virtual crowds
This weekend saw some of the biggest names in music – from Lady Gaga to the Rolling Stones – perform to millions from their front rooms as part of the The One World: Together at Home concert. But there were also some less known acts attracting huge audiences online.
Mark Summers, an Elvis performer, said he was humbled after a live-streamed event on Saturday evening – in which he sang requests from his home in the West Midlands – racked up 75,000 views and raised more than £13,000 for the NHS. People tuned in from as far a field as Dubai and Thailand.
Summers sang Elvis classics like Suspicious Minds, Don’t Be Cruel and Always on my Mind, and played a specially recorded message of support from Sir Cliff Richard saying: “The NHS is the greatest, Elvis was the greatest, they go really well together.”
Writing on his Facebook page, Summers said he had received messages from people saying they had felt depressed, lonely, and isolated from family, and that the performance had made them feel better. “Elvis’s music is so powerful it brings all age groups together, its fun, it’s moving and so much more,” he said.
Meanwhile beef farmer Andrew Sheldon from Draycott in Somerset has been dubbed the Somerset Crooner after sharing videos of himself singing on Facebook. Each song is dedicated to the NHS and frontline workers, and some recordings have had as many as 50,000 views in two hours.
“With all this coronavirus and that going on, there’s a lot of lonely people out there, sad people, one thing and the other, and I thought I’d like to lift people’s spirits up a bit,” he told the BBC.
West Brom stadium becomes a maternity clinic
Championship football club West Bromwich Albion have donated their stadium for use as a maternity clinic, so that expectant mothers can avoid hospital visits during the coronavirus crisis. The club has started providing free space in the East Stand suites at The Hawthorns stadium to deliver antenatal and postnatal care.
Sandwell and West Birmingham NHS trust said three clinics would be held Monday to Friday between 9am and 5pm, and would be staffed by 10 midwives and three support workers.
Helen Hurst, director of midwifery at the trust, said: “We wanted to provide an alternative space for women who are having antenatal and postnatal care. Women are slightly anxious about coming to hospital in the current climate so we wanted to find a safe space away from the hospital.”
She added: “We are really grateful to the Baggies for providing this space for women during this worrying time.”
And finally …
There has been a mixed response to a suggestion by the actor Idris Elba that the world should take a week of quarantine every year to “remember this time” once the pandemic is over. Elba, who starred in Luther and the Wire, told the Associated Press: “I think that the world should take a week of quarantine every year just to remember this time. Remember each other. I really do. I think it’s … other species use it. It’s called hibernation. But it does remind you that the world doesn’t tick on your time.”
Responding to the comment, one Twitter user said: “The world should go to war for a week to remember WW2.”
Elba announced last month that he had tested positive for coronavirus but had no symptoms. He attended the Wembley Arena We Day event on 4 March alongside Sophie Grégoire Trudeau, the wife of the Canadian prime minister, who also tested positive for the virus.
