Families of the nearly 240,000 people who have died from Covid-19 in Britain have hung festive lights on a London wall, a symbol of love, anger and pain ahead of another Christmas filled with loss.
As the fifth anniversary of the global pandemic approaches, emotions are still running high across Britain, amid accusations that the then government responded too slowly to the crisis.
Approximately 240,000 hearts have been hand-painted on the wall located on the banks of the Thames, in front of the British Parliament.
Each heart on the 500-metre-long (540 yards) wall represents one of Britain’s victims of the disease, which has ravaged and disrupted life around the world since it was first detected in China in December 2019.
“We put up lights every Christmas as a way to reflect and remember those who are no longer with us,” said Kirsten Hackman, 58, whose mother died of COVID in May 2020.
“For many of us, there’s that empty space at the table this Christmas,” he said.
Volunteers say the wall is a collective “therapy session”.
According to the World Health Organization, more than seven million people have died from Covid across the world since 2019. But the actual toll is believed to be much higher.
Thousands of messages written in hearts on a London wall reflect the depth of the emotional impact and wounds left by the pandemic on British life.
One reads, “Mammy, love you always,” while another says, “Phil, always in my heart.”
The Remembrance Wall was originally temporary, and was constructed without permission in March 2021 in protest against then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s handling of the pandemic.
He faced accusations of being too slow to recognize the threat of Covid and then taking too long to lock down the country to stop the spread of the highly contagious disease.
Lorelei King, whose husband died of Covid in March 2020, told AFP the wall is an “outpouring of love, rage and anger”.
The 71-year-old man is part of the “Friends of the Wall” group, a dozen volunteers who come every Friday to clean the monument, repaint rain-washed hearts and rewrite messages.
“It’s quite meditative”, she said.
The group continues to attract new hearts as Covid claims new lives.
The wall ‘brings me comfort’
But on the Friday before Christmas, volunteers gathered for another, more joyful mission: to hang lights on the wall.
They lit them on Monday, and the decorations will remain up until early January.
Nearly five years after the pandemic began, the pain is still the same, King said, adding that she was one of many who had not even been able to grieve properly.
“We weren’t able to have a real funeral,” he explained, due to lockdown rules, referring to the severe restrictions imposed on visiting loved ones in the hours before their dying and then holding large gatherings to mourn their loss. .
Instead, she focuses her energy on the wall. “That gives me comfort. And I don’t want the people we care about to be forgotten,” King said.
“We’re all in the same boat,” said Michelle Rumble, 53, whose mother died of COVID in April 2020.
She was there on the first day, when some hearts were painted, following a social media call from the activist group Led by Donkeys.
Over the next 10 days, despite the risk of arrest for damaging the listed wall, hundreds of people who lost loved ones came to pay their respects.
Rumball recalled, “I was very angry at the time. It was a demonstration.”
The group is in discussions with authorities to make the wall, whose maintenance depends on donations, “permanent” and officially recognized, meaning it can be better protected.
And a few days before Christmas, they had a “very positive” meeting, King said.
More than 232,000 people have died from Covid in the United Kingdom, according to WHO. By comparison, France has had about 168,000 deaths.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
