THE wife of taxi driver has criticised health officials for not alerting all GPs in Edinburgh to the symptoms of Legionnaires’ disease after the first case was confirmed on 31 May.
Elayne Fraser said her husband Ronnie developed flu-like symptoms on Wednesday, 30 May, followed by a bad cough two days later.
When his condition deteriorated on Saturday, Mrs Fraser telephoned for a doctor to come to their home in Gorgie. She said the doctor made a brief visit and said: “It’s just a viral infection he’s got…Keep taking the paracetamol, you’ll have the virus for another three or four days.”
Mrs Fraser said: “I’m really angry about that because I think they would have been told about this by then.”
She said a second doctor came out the next day and said her husband, whose condition had worsened, would need an X-ray and arranged for an ambulance to take him to hospital. The ambulance took six and a half hours to arrive, during which time Mr Fraser’s breathing was deteriorating.
Mr Fraser, 50, is in the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary, being treated with antibiotics.
