monique roffey, winning the costa book of the year.th covid. more than 35,000 are still in hospital across the uk. the chief medical officer for england professor chris whitty has warned that the death toll will remain high for some weeks before the effects of the vaccine begin to be felt. 0ur health editor hugh pym reports from king's mill hospital in mansfield. machine beeps. every day in intensive care is a daunting challenge for staff as they strive to keep patients alive. some of the shifts that i have had are the toughest i've ever had, in particular, one night shift i had last week was one of the worst shifts i've had in 21 years of nursing. from experience, i can tell you that i'm seeing more sicker patients this time then i saw in the first wave. doctors are trained to deal with death, but nothing like this. umar has had to cope with the savage impact of covid, both in hisjob and at home. my parents have got covid. my mother—in—law is in the icu and ijust lost some dear family relatives of covid, so when you see these patients