First virus patients 'would not now need hospital care'

Dr Matthias Schmid said had the patients been taken ill weeks later they would not have been hospitalised

The doctor who treated the first two coronavirus patients in the UK said if they had displayed similar symptoms now they would not need hospital care.

Dr Matthias Schmid led the team at Newcastle's Royal Victoria Infirmary (RVI), where they came on 31 January.

As it was a high-consequence infectious disease they required admission then regardless of how ill they were.

But with the same symptoms at the current stage of the pandemic they would be told to self-isolate at home.

The pair, Chinese nationals who were from the same family, had been visiting York when they became ill.

As they were thought to have coronavirus they were transferred to the RVI, as it was a specialist centre.

'Sheer excitement'

Dr Schmid, who is head of infectious diseases, said: "At the time the situation was classed as being highly dangerous - we had the reports from Wuhan of many patients dying.

"In one way we were very excited, preparing for it the previous weeks and being ready for the situation.

"Not like a funfair excitement, but sheer excitement we were now in action."

Senior sister at the RVI, Margaret Ward, was one of the team who helped care for them.

She said: "I got a phone call at about four in the morning and I immediately dived into the car and came to work.

"Things that were going through my mind were, 'how were staffing levels and how ill were the patients going to be?'."

Senior sister Margaret Ward said she was called in the early hours and came straight to work

The patients made a full recovery and were discharged on 15 February.

Dr Schmid added: "The patients were actually very well indeed and had mild symptoms. In fact if it had been a few weeks on they would not have been admitted to hospital.

"We did take a lot of samples from them and learned about the infectiousness of the bug."