The family of Yusuf Mahmud Nazir have said the five-year-old has already saved ‘hundreds and hundreds of children’s lives’ after they met Health Secretary Wes Streeting to discuss Yusuf’s Law
A family who noticed something was ‘very wrong’ with their son were told ambulances are ‘not a taxi’ just hours before he died.
Yusuf Mahmud Nazir died at Sheffield Children’s Hospital in November 2022, eight days after a visit to Rotherham Hospital where he was sent home with antibiotics. Yesterday, his family met with Health Secretary Wes Streeting in London to discuss their campaign for Yusuf’s Law – and said that the five-year-old has already saved “hundreds and hundreds of children’s lives.”
The family is advocating for national guidelines that consider parents’ intuition when they feel something is “very wrong” with their child after their concerns were tragically dismissed. They also discussed the report into Yusuf’s care, which was published in July, and were told by the Health Secretary that the recommendations would not “gather dust”
Speaking to the Mirror after the meeting in London, Yusuf’s uncle, Zaheer Ahmed, 42, said: “Yusuf’s legend is already saving lives”.
“It’s important that this is taken very seriously and these concerns are addressed nationally,” he said. He shared how they had discussed the impact Yusuf’s story is having on preventing others from suffering the same fate, reports the Mirror.
“Maybe his life was shortened to save hundreds and hundreds of other children. We want to prevent any other child going through what Yusuf’s been through. Within the local hospitals we can see that people are using Yusuf’s name, to get the right care. His name is getting used quite a lot.
“Some of the trusts are also using Yusuf’s name in their training. His legend is saving people’s lives. Wes Streeting also made a comment on that and said ‘we are sure Yusuf has saved many many lives already’.”
Speaking about the pain of losing their son when his life could have been saved, he said: “It’s absolutely broken our hearts, it’s destroyed our hearts. Thinking about what could have been done, what could have been easily preventable. If only we’d been listened to, if only it was acted on, if only we were taken seriously, then Yusuf would have been still with us”.
The family have described how they pleaded for antibiotics, were informed an ambulance was ‘not a taxi’ and witnessed other youngsters also unwell and waiting in corridors. Mr Ahmed continued: “There’s not a day goes by where we don’t speak about Yusuf, where we’re not sharing family photographs of Yusuf.
“Our other children, Yusuf’s cousins, Yusuf’s brothers, they’re all struggling daily, asking ‘when’s Yusuf coming back? He’s been gone for a while, when’s he back? He’s not answering our face time. He’s got two brothers, one one is thirteen years old and one just turned eighteen. It’s very, very difficult for them because they’re asking ‘why has Yusuf been taken? Why did Yusuf die? Why did it have to be him?’ It’s left us with a lifetime of trauma.”
A solicitor representing the family previously stated at a pre-inquest review hearing that the family believed there were “a number of significant systems failures” in Sheffield and Rotherham. The boy’s family have consistently maintained they were told “there are no beds and not enough doctors” in the emergency department at Rotherham, and that Yusuf should have been admitted and given intravenous antibiotics.
The report into his care, published in July, concluded: “Our primary finding is that the parental concerns, particularly the mother’s instinct that her child was unwell, were repeatedly not addressed across services. A reliance on clinical metrics over caregiver insight caused distress for the family.
“This led to a lack of shared decision-making and there was limited evidence of collaborative discussions with Yusuf’s family around clinical decisions, leading to a sense of exclusion and reduced trust in care plans.”
Yusuf, who suffered from asthma, was taken to a GP with a sore throat and nausea on 15 November 2022. An advanced nurse practitioner prescribed him antibiotics.
Later that evening, his parents took him to Rotherham Hospital’s urgent and emergency care centre, where he was seen in the early hours of the morning following a six-hour wait. He was discharged with a diagnosis of severe tonsillitis, and an extended prescription of antibiotics.
Two days afterwards, Yusuf received additional antibiotics from his GP for a suspected chest infection, but his relatives grew so worried they called an ambulance and demanded paramedics transport him to Sheffield Children’s Hospital, instead of Rotherham.
Yusuf was admitted to intensive care on November 21 but developed multi-organ failure and suffered multiple cardiac arrests from which he could not recover.
A comprehensive inquest into his death is scheduled to begin on April 13 next year.
Mr Ahmed, accompanied at the meeting by Yusuf’s mother, Soniya Ahmed, and solicitor Anna Thwaites, said: “We believe that the inquest will come out with a lot more truth about what happened to Yusuf. We wanted to make sure that parents’ voices are heard, it’s very important that parents get their voices heard.”
At a press conference earlier this year, Yusuf’s mum Soniya Ahmed spoke of being tormented by her son’s desperate pleas of ‘mummy I can’t breathe’ – and said her “happy little boy” had been let down “catastrophically”.
She said: “For the medical staff there are lessons to be learnt from this tragedy, but for us, our life, Yusuf has been taken away from us in the most horrific way.
“My son went into hospital with tonsillitis and he never returned home. My son was left to die right beside me. He was crying in pain. Yet received no pain relief.
“…The report concludes that 13 missed opportunities to escalate Yusuf’s care. All while I was trusting the NHS to protect him. They failed him catastrophically. “
