Bereaved families are urging the government to protect the National Covid Memorial Wall – a South Bank monument decorated with over 200,000 hearts commemorating people who died during the pandemic.
Volunteers, many of whom were denied the right to hold their loved ones’ hands as they passed away, say the 0.5km wall is “a visual representation of the UK’s catastrophic loss”.
A government commission has recommended preserving the memorial but Westminster – opposite the monument across the Thames – has refused to give its official support raising concerns about its long term future.
The National Covid Memorial Wall was established in March 2021 – the brainchild of campaign group Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice and the activist group Led By Donkeys.
But currently, its survival and funding depend on a group of roughly ten volunteers, who visit the wall every Friday to repaint the hearts weathered by the Thames’ spray.
Among those is Fran Hall, 63, who has been braving sub-zero temperatures to spruce up the memorial. Her husband Steve died from Covid-19 just three weeks after their wedding day.
“If we weren’t here every week repainting it, the wall would not exist… there needs to be a decision made and it needs to be made at government level,” she said.
Fran says the hearts have “taken on the identity” of the people who died because families were “denied” the “normal rituals of grief and mourning” like proper funerals.
“People reference their heart as if it’s their person,” she said. “They say: ‘My dad’s on the wall, I want to go see my mum, I’m taking flowers to my brother.’”
But the group says they haven’t received explicit backing from the government or St Thomas’ Hospital, which owns the wall, meaning the memorial’s future is uncertain.
In many ways, the wall has always been on shaky ground. When roughly 1,500 volunteers descended on the South Bank to paint hearts in March 2021, they were defying warnings of £10,000 fines and three-month jail stints.
But in September last year, the UK Commission on Covid Commemoration recommended “preserving existing memorials, including the National Covid Memorial Wall”.
Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer only said her department would “consider” the “valuable recommendations”.
Among those who regularly visit the wall is Lorelei King, 70, whose husband Vincent died from Covid-19 while living in care on March 31, 2020.
An actor from the US, she met “very handsome”, “very funny”, “manly man” Vince while working on a BBC Radio play.
Lorelei jokes that she thought he was “such an arseh*le” when they first met. But she soon learned he was “the most loveable person”.
She says she’ll never forget that she “couldn’t be with him when he died, that I was obeying the rules and didn’t go to visit him”.
Lorelei says she’s “grateful” that she got to spend some time with Vince’s body before “men in hazmat suits came to take him away”.
She added: “I’ve seen how much this wall mean to people.”
Then there’s Michelle Rumball, 52, whose mum Violet, “a loving, quiet, family-orientated” grandmother-of-thirteen, died from Covid-19 on April 9, 2020.
Asked what it was like losing her mum during the pandemic, she said: “Awful because we couldn’t see her.
“She died on her own. Nobody was allowed to see her. The last time I saw her she was being wheeled into an ambulance.”
Michelle added: “If you’ve not been bereaved by Covid nobody tends to understand what you’ve gone through.”
There is a political side to the group’s campaign. Michelle and Fran were among the four women who were kicked out of the Covid inquiry after waving signs during Boris Johnson’s testimony.
A chilling message was written across their placards: “The dead can’t hear your apologies.”
Fran said the Covid inquiry, set up to examine the UK’s response to, and the impact of, the pandemic, had been “disappointing”.
“The questioning is restricted, very restricted. The number of seats for bereaved people is very restricted,” Fran said. “I had high hopes for it and I would say those hopes are diminishing.”
A Department for Culture, Media and Sport spokesperson said: “The government is in the process of reviewing the recommendations made by the UK Commission on Covid Commemoration and will respond to the report in due course.”
A Lambeth Council spokesperson said: “The National Covid Memorial Wall is a poignant tribute to the devasting impact that Covid-19 has had on people’s lives across this country. Lambeth Council would be keen to join discussions about making it permanent and agree this would be a fitting decision.”
A spokesperson for Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust said: “We will work with the relevant organisations to reach a decision about the future of the memorial wall.”