On Wednesday, May 12 you printed a very good article by your reporter Jane Reader, it was titled "Corona hit trust's staff".

It stated in the article that 62,025 full-time staff days were lost due to sickness at Dorset healthcare University NHS foundation trust, between March and December.

This figure together with many others quoted in the article are quite astonishing.

I was left wondering how they compare with staff sickness levels within our major supermarkets, whose employees have continued working on the front line since the pandemic started.

On the face of it, it does seem that supermarket employees have not been greatly affected by coronavirus, or if they have and have suffered shortages of labour then they have obviously covered those staff shortages and coped extremely well.

If this is so then perhaps a lesson could be learnt here by the NHS and in saying this, I'm not looking to criticise NHS doctors are nurses, but maybe best practice/improvements could be explored, to the benefit of all.

I do feel most strongly though that supermarket employees have been the forgotten unsung heroes throughout this pandemic.

We see from time-to-time members of the royal family or government, take the trouble to personally thank NHS staff for the work they have done during the pandemic.

It would be good if this could be extended to all supermarket staff in recognition of what they have done during the pandemic, who in continuing to do the job they do, have served us all well and deserve our respect and gratitude.

Colin Moyes

Hamworthy