The medical team at Sainsbury Hospital were treating the Skripals for opioid overdose without any extra precautions, until UK chemical weapon experts "confirmed" nerve agent poisoning and "advised" them on treatment, BBC reports.
Staff at Salisbury District Hospital say that former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, who were found unconscious on a bench in Salisbury on March 4, were initially treated for opioid overdose, a new documentary reveals.
"The evening that Yulia and Sergei were admitted, at that point
we were led to believe that they have taken an overdose, so there was no mention of nerve agent poisoning," Sarah Clark, ward sister in charge of the shift on March 4,
told BBC2's
Newsnight in an interview broadcast on Tuesday. "They were needing their support with their breathing and support with their cardiovascular system."
Some initial reports on the Skripals indicated that emergency services suspected the powerful drug fentanyl may have been involved. The highly addictive synthetic opiate has been linked to a sharp increase in overdoses in the US and has also resulted in dozens of deaths across the UK.
The medical staff was apparently
so sure of the drug overdose diagnosis that they
did not even consider taking special precaution to protect themselves against potential exposure to the deadly military grade chemical agent, which they were soon convinced caused the ailment of the Skripals.
"At first, when they first came in,
there was no indication of the fact that it was a nerve agent. And therefore, we take our normal protection when any patient comes in but would have not at that point taken any extra precaution in terms of protecting ourselves," Clark said.
Comment: A full two days after exposure to a weapons-grade nerve agent with no proper treatment, no symptoms of nerve agent exposure, no local tests to determine if a nerve agent was involved (only Porton Down's say-so), and a miraculous recovery. It's almost sounds as if the Salisbury doctors are getting their side of the story out so that no one can accuse them of anything shady. Instead, they place the potential blame for that on Porton Down.