My story: Curlet

With the killing of George Floyd in the USA, the news about coronavirus and its greater impact on black people, I’m left feeling like we always get the raw end of everything. We are always at the end of the line.

We’re not happy and no one seems to care. The Prime Minister talks about it and doesn’t care. He’s not talking enough.

I hear so many stories of our people who go into hospital and feel as if they’re chucked into a corner. It’s a different side of racism. You go into hospital and you’re ill and they leave you there and your life is not seen as important. It’s an opportunity for people who don’t like us to treat us badly. My mother in law, who’s in her nineties, is petrified of getting ill for that reason.

I think more black people die from coronavirus because they’re working extra hard, extra-long, to make sure their jobs are done properly. They want to be recognised for what they do and don’t feel they are. The young black nurse who was pregnant who died early on during the pandemic. Why did she put herself and the child she was carrying into danger? I believe she felt she had to do more than other people. You don’t want to look like you’re not ‘doing your job’.  

I saw an advert for the NHS and all the nurses on the poster are white. Any hospital I’ve walked in to, the majority of the staff is black. Why were none of them invited to take part?

The take up in the UK of Black Lives Matter is a long time coming. Even Megan was treated as if she was something on the bottom of someone’s shoe.

Things have to change. Come on. Give us a break.