E&S comment: Help Margot to help others

The adorable little girl with the smile that turned more than 50,000 people into potential stem cell donors turns two today, surrounded by family and friends.

Her parents Vicki and Yaser have done more than any mother and father can to help her to fight two forms of leukaemia.

Despite finding the donor they searched for all over the country, their little girl now has a chance of less than one per cent of recovering.

The decision is one that no parent should ever have to make - to choose between spending the remaining time in and out of hospitals for the slenderest of chances or to enjoy their precious child's smile.

In the 24 months that Margot has been here, she has inspired people to help others by registering themselves as stem cell donors.

In just seven days after a video of Margot was released online, the Anthony Nolan Trust received a 300 per cent increase in the number of applications.

And even in the face of unbearable heartache, her remarkable parents have urged people to help the 37,000 other people across the world waiting for a life-saving bone marrow transplant. Their courage is incredible.

Today of all days, they deserve the time to spend with their beautiful child and celebrate her birthday.

For those who have never met Margot, but have been touched by her story, the best present they can give her now is to join the register of donors that can give others a fighting chance.

And after registering, we should all look to Margot and her family for inspiration.

Her time on the planet may turn out to be far shorter than it should.

It is unlikely that she can truly comprehend what an impression she has made and the sheer number of hearts that she has touched.

Everyone who has ever seen her will have been wishing for medical science to perform a miracle.

Through all of this Margot has smiled.

So as she celebrates and creates lasting, joyful memories for her parents and brothers, we remind everyone to look at teammargot.com and to consider whether they can help someone else. Tens of thousands already have because of Margot.

Don't just read her story.

Don't just like her on Facebook.

Don't just re-tweet her picture.

Register as a donor if you can.

Just one more might be all another child needs.

Eight hour hospital wait unacceptable

The epic eight-hour wait of an ambulance crew at a hospital in the West Midlands is unacceptable.

So too is the lack of transparency that means it is not known at which hospital this happened.

What we do know is that thankfully it did not take eight hours for any individual patient to be seen.

Various problems - be they staff shortages or a lack of beds at the hospital in question - kept the ambulance crew there for the equivalent of a whole working day.

This is not a fault of the paramedics. And it is to their credit that they looked after other patients who came and went so their colleagues could get back out on to the road where they were needed.

But it is another worrying sign that all is not right within the National Health Service.

Ambulance crews cannot be left propping up hospitals creaking either from a lack of funding or poor management.

And it should not take the Freedom of Information Act for these details to emerge in an incomplete form.

The hospital where this happened should have owned up to this and explained where the system has failed patients and hard working front line health staff.

Only then can this be put right.