Ian said: “The team approached us about helping to distribute the supplies around the UK, and also the international Express team about transporting goods into the UK. The doctors were very knowledgeable and passionate about what they were doing and we had the logistics expertise and were in a position to help, so we got involved.”

Ian and DHL supported the NHS in other ways too. For example through providing logistical support for the Nightingale Hospitals and converting warehouse space into specific storage facilities, plus adapting some existing patient transport vehicles so that they caould move COVID patients in the capital. His division also produced COVID-19 testing kits going from 1,000 per day to 16,000 per day in a few weeks.

Initially David (Law, 1989), who is the Senior Partner at Fieldfisher LLP, was approached by a client who is also behind the campaign. With the fundraising going even better than all expectations, they needed legal expertise to help with purchasing from China and transportation to the UK.

David said: “The plan was to buy from a factory in China and then transport the masks to the UK before distributing directly to hospitals in need. Fortunately we have three offices in China and I was able to contact my Managing Partner in China who immediately jumped at the opportunity to help. We then started working on the contractual negotiations with the factory and have now helped on all of their subsequent purchases and also internal governance issues for the fund raising.”

Yahya said: “I’ve always taught him that being a doctor is not a job actually, it is a duty, and we have to fulfil our duty that we have been privileged to serve. So I am really pleased to see him doing that and I feel really proud for him to be working in the same hospital as me.”

Tayyib said: “From a very young age, seeing my father come home from work, he would always regale me with the tales of what had been happening on the wards and I would always have a lot of questions. He has always been a role model for me to look up to.”

Alumnus helps provide IT solutions for COVID-19 testing and booking websites

Alumnus Laurence Leach (Engineering, 2003) has been working as the lead architect on the new NHS COVID-19 national testing and booking websites with the company ACF Technologies where he is Technical Director.

Laurence says: “In my professional role I’ve always strived to adopt more standardised technology, adhere to best practises, deliver better training for team-members, and learn as much as possible about technology, projects, business, markets etc. When we were approached by the NHS as potential suppliers, we were asked if we could react in a very short time period. Previous years of enabling the business with technologies and standards allowed us to react very quickly to a pretty much unprecedented situation!