I’m a soap star and I’ve seen things in Blackpool Victoria I can’t unsee

Actress Cheryl Fergison, best known for playing Heather Trott in EastEnders between 2007 and 2012, took to her Instagram page this week to share a terrible ordeal she faced over the Easter weekend.

The 58-year-old mum of one, who lives in Lytham St Annes, revealed she had spent 24 hours in Blackpool Victoria Hospital in “complete agony” and now that she is out the other end, she took to her Instagram page to reflect on the things she had seen and to thank the NHS staff for their work.

Introducing her video, a dressing gown-cladded Cheryl said: “Hi everyone, I’ve just spent the last 24 hours in A&E at Blackpool Victoria Hospital. I’ve seen things in the last 24 hours I can’t unsee. I’ve been in complete agony, I’ve been made a million times better by the angels that are all of the NHS staff, which I want to thank like big time. When people say they don’t get paid enough- they really don’t get paid enough. We’ve got a broken system. It’s gone to pot, it’s shot but it’s still amazing and we still have it, just, by a thread.” 

The former Celebrity Big Brother star continued: “I wanna say firstly a huge thank you, I’m feeling a lot better, and when you sit for 24 hours in a chair in an A&E department being shipped off every six hours to go and get IV antibiotic drops and go back again, and sit in the waiting room of the A&E when you see much more, other things keep happening, because they’re simply are no beds, no wards, no anything. People are waiting up to 60 hours to be put on a ward. I met a man there who had been there over 30 hours and he still hadn’t got a bed.”

Cheryl did not reveal why in particular she had to go to Blackpool Victoria Hospital, instead, the actress’ attention turned to some of the people she saw in A&E as she urged her followers to be more considerate of other people and of the strains on the NHS.

The soap star said: “I just can’t believe the way that some people are, some people are like animals, they’re like savages, they have no respect for the NHS staff or the people around them who are sick, who are ill. They come in with minor things that could be treated with some paracetamol or if they thought about it, they needn’t even bother the doctors and nurses and the teams of the NHS staff.

“They don’t think, they just come in and go ‘oh it’s free, I’ll use it’, when there are truly sick people out there who need to use the services and there was young, there was old and there was vulnerable, there was people with mental illness, there was police having to deal with people who had just lost the plot, been in fights, done all sorts of things, robbed people and it had gone wrong so they’d come into A&E and sat next to an older lady who had just clearly had a fall and couldn’t… function and I feel like we need to stop abusing our system that we have at the moment, that is free, that was set up for people who could get the best care and let me tell you, you know what, they don’t get paid enough. Sorry, they do not. For the abuse, for the care, for the hours, for the lack of sleep they have, for the continuous care even when they’ve come off shift. I sat for 24 hours and watched this. At some points I was quite tearful, I had my head down.”

In the next part of the video, Cheryl told of how, even in her vulernable state, other patients in the Blackpool Victoria Hospital tried to take pictures of her and she begged people to “please, please, please, please” leave herself and other stars in peace when it is clearly inappropriate to bother them.

She said: “When people see you and they ask for pictures and they ask for signed photographs or they want to chat to you- that’s fine, but there are certain places you just don’t do that and you don’t take sneaky little pictures and you don’t try to get people, and that’s in a hospital. I was at my most vulnerablest, my most sickest, my most weakest, at most of the point without my family around me because they had to go home and get sleep and I was just having to wait for more tests and drips and things. And I just thought, my god what is the matter with people that they’ve become so desensitised to peoples emotions and sensitivities. 

“I couldn’t get any rest obviously there, it was very clear I wasn’t well, it was very clear that I was at my most vulnerablest and my weakest and that I was thrown in with everyone else- like I should be- waiting my turn, sitting in a waiting room in A&E full of blood, vomit, every other type of spillage. Don’t take pictures, don’t take pictures of me when I’m ill because there’s something not quite right with you when you’re doing things like that, I don’t quite get what you’re getting out of it or what you expect to get. Maybe you’re gonna sell it to the paper? Well I’m trying to get there first and let people know, don’t bother. And if you’re a paper that’s going to print people being sick and vulnerable and at their worst… then more shame on you paper for taking that picture and more shame to the people for serving that picture.”

Cheryl then began to cry as she added: “I’m going to go get some sleep now, I just want to say thank you NHS and nurses. You are so amazing, so amazing and don’t let anybody stop your passion for caring for people because I always use the term human kind, and I think you truly are human kind and you have to deal with so much now and there’s not enough of you and there’s not enough money, and this government has just torn it apart bit by bit by bit over the years and made it into something that is not accessible for everybody because.. the services are not there. I mean there are doctors trying to sort you out with no equipment there or equipment that’s not working. 

“Look I pray that everybody is healthy and happy- but if you ever become in a situation, or your family or anyone are in a situation where you have to use these services, think before you use them, think before you go down to the hospitals, use the 111s, use the walk in clinics first then use the hospitals as your last port of call if that’s what the clinics and everybody have told you to do... We have our own kind of war zone.”

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For her final thoughts, Cheryl said: “Thank you Blackpool Victoria Hospital, thank you for functioning over this Easter weekend when the sun was out and people were getting a bit lairy or they might have a little accident or people just getting drunk and disorderly or obviously having mental health issues - they dealt with everything, they dealt with everything. I take my hat off to you guys and thank you for your care.

“And no there was no priority treatment, there was nothing. What I love about living up north is they don’t care whether you’ve been in a soap in London or on the telly or whatever, they simply say it as it is and I love it, I love it, I love the people. And I think I’m a bit tearful because I need some sleep, thank you for the well wishes and things, I’m on the mend and I’ll be back very soon.”