END THE SEPSIS SCANDAL

IN February 2016, actor Jason Watkins and his wife Clara Francis launched the Mail’s end The Sepsis Scandal campaign by sharing the heartbreaking story of their two-year-old daughter Maude, who died on New year’s Day in 2011 after doctors missed the warning signs of sepsis. This led to new official guidelines on recognising and treating the condition. He says: Talking about Maude’s death is never easy, but it has always been important for us to do so. i took the lead from my wife. Clara refused to be a victim. She really wanted everyone to know what had happened.

For us it was as much a cathartic thing as it was altruistic, our way of not allowing Maude to disappear from our lives or the lives of others, but we also felt very strongly that it was important to spread the word about sepsis as widely as possible. Sepsis can develop so quickly, and frequently from a simple cause — even a cut finger. in Maude’s case, it was flu and a streptococcal infection. The tragedy is it is so easily o v e r looked, even by medical professionals, until it is too late.

Our aim has always been to get everyone who finds themselves in the same situation we were in ten years ago to ask the question, ‘Could it be sepsis?’ That was a question i was unable to ask, because i was not even aware of sepsis until the inquest six months after Maude’s death, which was the first time i heard the word mentioned.

in 2016, we willingly agreed to help launch the Daily Mail’s End The Sepsis Scandal campaign by telling our story. good Health has an amazing track record of

championing important causes. It has an extraordinary reach, it has a clarity, it raises issues continuously and it does what good journalism does — it applies pressure where it’s needed and invites people and organisations to improve.

The way it has covered sepsis in general, and what happened to Maude and us in particular, has been extraordinary.

It not only raised awareness among readers but created the pressure that in 2016 helped to persuade then health secretary Jeremy Hunt to launch a sepsis-awareness poster campaign. The following year NICE published a quality standard for health professionals covering the recognition, diagnosis and early management of sepsis in the medical profession.

The Mail has been an important ally and encouraging force for us and we are incredibly grateful for this.

Tragically, there are still too many cases like ours and there’s still much to be done in raising awareness. For me, that means never missing an opportunity to remind people of the causes and symptoms that can be so easily overlooked.