'This is one of the emails we have received on the subject. We have removed the name of the person and the hospital involved at the writer's request:

I can categorically confirm that DNR notices are being placed on elderly patients, including those who are healthy and for whom there is no existing health condition to justify it. Not just those who have no viral infection, but also no underlying health conditions. This is being done based upon age alone. Which is illegal.

My 83-year-old mother has been until very recently in the [hospital] with an orthopaedic problem in need of specialist rehab, but is otherwise completely healthy. She was approached last Friday (20 March) by the ward consultant, who tried to coerce her into signing a DNR form. She has no underlying health conditions, other than problems affecting the lower limbs, and there is no clinical reason for such a thing to be put in place. She challenged the consultant, demanding to know what possible reason there could be, given her healthy condition, and was explicitly told that it was because of her age. She refused to co-operate. There are people working with her in an advocacy capacity, though she is entirely compos mentis and very sharp for someone of her age, and her advocate declared this to be illegal. There is already a formal complaint being lodged, for all the good that will do.

A few days later, earlier this week, the ward matron told her that she had not been singled out, and that everybody was being treated in the same way - all the elderly patients were being required to sign these forms. And that it is a 'rule', something that has come down from on high, that has to be done, and has to cover all the older patients, 'because the government says so'. QED.

My immediate reaction to this, beside being outraged, was to make the very observation that while we have this current farce unfolding on the phoney pretext of 'saving the elderly', the selfsame elderly are being asked to line themselves up for euthanasia by the back door. Many of them not having sufficient capacity to really understand what they are agreeing to, given the cognitive status of the overwhelming majority on that ward. And my next thought was that if it was happening there, it was probably happening in many other hospitals. Upon learning what the ward matron told my mother, it is evidently a matter of government policy.

In terms of 'saving the elderly', my mother doesn't require saving from anything, as she is very fit, has a robust immune system, and rarely even catches a cold. Proof that age and severe ill health are not something that can be equated.

The consultant who tried to coerce her into signing the form on 20 March, had two days previously, on 18 March, been extremely rude to her, including remarking that, 'You're in the right place here, if you want to die'. Make of that what you will.

Also, I don't know if this is correct, but I think you should know about the following:

Two or three days ago, a member of the lowest pay-grade staff at the hospital told my mother that they are using cleansing products, including apparently Dettol, the manufacture of which predates the beginning of this current farce, carrying information on its labelling noting that it is effective against coronavirus. I am told that it is in the small print on the back, but it is there. I do not know whether this is just something standard, that would usually be listed, and alluding to all forms of coronavirus, or whether it is specific to the one that is currently being hyped up. If it is specific, then the member of staff is correct, that this whole situation is entirely man-made, deliberate, and calculated - this is what the staff member believes.

I very much hope that the foregoing will be helpful. If there is anything more I can do, I will only too happy to help.'