Staff at Cooperative Bank collect thank you cards and pictures from people of Chesterfield for frontline NHS staff and Covid-19 patients

Thank you to NHS staff. Staff at the Co-operative Bank in Chesterfield have decided to write thank you cards for NHS staff to show appreciation and cheer them up in these difficult times. Vicki Toon, Linda Hemsworth, Hannah Challenger, Jodie Morris and Holly Walker.

The team, led by branch manager Jodie Morris, has now gathered more than 30 cards of thanks and well wishes, along with 50 pictures and drawings made by local schools and nurseries, which it plans to send to those working at three hospitals, in Chesterfield, Derby and Sheffield.

They’ve also collected Get Well cards and pictures for Covid-19 patients who are unable to have visitors, in an effort to help brighten their day.

"It’s obviously been a difficult year, and while a lot of people referenced those working on the frontline throughout the first lockdown, we wanted to make sure that appreciation for everything they’re doing was still there,” said Jodie.

Some of the pictures made by local nurseries and schools for staff and patients at local hospitals

“One of my staff members has a daughter working on a Covid ward, and she was saying that sometimes they feel as though people have forgotten what’s going on, and aren’t taking it seriously anymore.

"We wanted to help give them a second wind, by showing how much we – and our customers across Chesterfield – support them, and that they’re appreciated.”

Staff at the bank have been handing out blank thank you cards to customers who’ve visited the branch since Christmas, as well as getting in touch with local schools and nurseries to ask them to create pictures and messages which they can include in the bundle.

Jodie continued: “Some of the messages that people have written have been really lovely, and prove that the frontline NHS workers are as much in people’s thoughts as ever.

"The Get Well messages for patients who aren’t getting visitors are really nice too, and we hope they’ll brighten up somebody’s bedside.

"This has been a really nice positive focus for my team too during this time.”

The branch will be sending all its cards and messages to Chesterfield Royal Hospital, and two others in Sheffield and Derby, on February 12. Anybody who has anything else they’d like to drop in to send, can do so before this date.