A British Pakistani nurse with coronavirus died on Friday after spending weeks in intensive care. Areema Nasreen, 36, mother of three children, had been working as a nurse at the West Midlands’ Walsall Manor Hospital. Areema is now believed to be the youngest health worker to die in the UK after contracting the dangerous virus. Four doctors on the frontline have tragically lost their lives to the virus in the UK.
Hospital sources said Areema developed symptoms of COVID-19 on March 13, including body aches, a high temperature and then a cough. She had tested positive for coronavirus a week later and a doctor at the hospital said her condition deteriorated very quickly.
When her illness was first reported on March 23, she was said to have had no underlying health issues and was described as normally fit and healthy by her family while she was on a ventilator in the hospital where she worked. The news of Nasreen’s death devastated her many friends and family. Her parents are from Kallar Syedan in Rawalpindi district, but moved to Walsall near Birmingham. She worked for the NHS for more than 16 years, first as a healthcare assistant before studying to become a fully qualified nurse last year. In a statement issued on Friday, Walsall Healthcare Trust paid tribute to her as “one of its family”, while the director of the Royal College of Nursing described Areema as “a leading figure in the West Midlands nursing community.” “Today, we lost one of our family,” Chief Executive of Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust Richard Beeken said. “We would like to pay tribute to Areema Nasreen who sadly passed away in the early hours of this morning. Any death is devastating, but losing one of our own is beyond words. Areema was extremely committed to her role as a staff nurse on the Acute Medical Unit at Manor Hospital, Beeken added.
