Coronavirus: 'Who can do this to our daughter?'

Peggy and Orla McKenna pictured in happier days at a family wedding

Peggy and Seamus McKenna are grateful for their family - but someone has been missing for the last 20 months.

Their 52-year-old daughter Orla has a learning disability and lives in Abingdon Manor care home, Belfast.

Before the pandemic, she came home to her parents every weekend. She was known and loved in her community.

But for 20 months she has not been able to return and the family have had very limited visits to see her.

"This child was so much a part of our life... she was our life," said Peggy.

"She doesn't know what's happened to us, we're there and then we're not there.

"Who has the right to do that to her?"

Mrs McKenna said that she was "all for people and everybody's life matters," but also asked the Belfast Trust: "Where's my child's life coming into this... my child's civil rights and her rights to be a human being?"

It is not just visits home that Orla has been missing out on.

Peggy McKenna holds a mug with a picture of her daughter which was a gift from Orla

She normally attends a day centre five times a week. But since last March, she has not left her nursing home.

"She has three boxes - Abingdon, home and Suffolk (day centre)," said her mother.

"While those three boxes are operating, she will be quite happy in one, two or three but they've taken two of them away altogether.

"Years ago, when we were young if there was a person with a learning disability they weren't advertised but you'd have seen them at the window looking out.

"I'll be damned until I take my last breath if I allow the Belfast Trust to make decisions for them that are adverse to their well being."

Brenda is concerned for her sister, Orla, and also for her mother and father who miss their daughter so much

The family cannot bring Orla home even for a short visit because of Covid rules.

Peggy and Seamus' daughter, Brenda, said what was happening to people with learning difficulties felt like "a step back in time".

She and her mother joined other families in a protest at Stormont on Saturday.

At the protest, relatives said they want certain policies re-examined because of the detrimental effect the Covid rules were having on those they love.

"We can't, after 20 months, ignore the significance of what is happening to them. We need to try to build back," said Brenda.

"Even if it was only a bus taking them as a bubble, out somewhere for a run or an ice-cream a couple of times a week or even having access to that day centre where in the evenings you could bring them down to do an activity - it's just the bus, getting out, a change of scenery, it could really have a positive impact on their lives."

She is concerned also for her parents who miss their daughter so much.

"Orla has been their life, all their lives. Orla means everything to them. For parents of people with learning disabilities, they remain their child," she said.

"For Orla, and my mother, she's still her baby and needs to be looked after and protected."

She said her parents talk about whether her mother, who is 83 years old, could die before ever seeing Orla at home again.

Seamus and Peggy McKenna worry that Orla does not understand what has happened to them

"The inhumanity of it and the reality of that," she said.

"I try to be reassuring and say there is hope, but it's very hard because 20 months into this pandemic and with so many others, they haven't had any freedom to leave these places."

Both the Belfast Trust and Abingdon Manor care home have been contacted for a response.