A senior nurse who contracted Covid-19 and spent a month battling the virus, was cheered out of hospital in an emotional exit.

Alicia Borja, 63, was met with colleagues from the A&E and other departments at Northwick Park Hospital in Harrow as they cheered her on her way home after recovering from the virus.

During the period of her illness, she remained isolated from her family and friends and kept in contact with her loved ones through social media.

After leaving the hospital, the senior nurse said: “I just want to thank my colleagues, I’ve got so much love for them, they are such a fantastic team.

“I haven’t been able to see my daughters for a month so can’t wait to get home.

“It’s been really rough, I stopped watching the new because I wanted to focus on being positive and put all my effort into getting home.

“I’m a nurse but it’s still scary to go through something like this. I was in tears when I was discharged because so many colleagues lined the corridors to wish me well. They are my second family.”

Harrow Times:

The London North West University Healthcare NHS Trust, which runs a series of hospitals including Northwick Park and Ealing Hospital, was among the first to treat Covid-19 patients because of the size and expertise of its infectious diseases team.

The team’s first Covid-19 admission was on March 4. Since then, the Trusts’ hospitals reconfigured its services, wards and staff at an unprecedented scale.

At present, more than 250 people are currently being treated across the three hospitals run by the trust. So far, 523 Covid-19 patients have been successfully discharged – including the senior nurse.

Chris Brown, the chief executive of the trust, said: “We wish Alicia and her family all the best.

“We all know this is going to be a long struggle, but staff across the NHS are giving it their all.

“The number of people who turned up to cheer Alicia out of hospital was touching and shows how much staff care about their colleagues.”