Hospital staff tell of ‘outpouring of hatred’

Staff at the hospital where brain cancer sufferer Ashya King was treated before he was taken abroad by his parents have spoken about the “outpouring of hatred” they received — but said they would act in the same way if it happened again.

Medics at Southampton General Hospital told a BBC documentary how the torrent of abuse basically shut down the hospital’s switchboard after it “became a story of a hospital who was chasing down a family”.

One doctor said that he received hate mail from someone telling him they wished his own children would get cancer and die.