Hello All,

I just want to say thank you so much for your support so far, its been a really tough ride for me and my family and I can imagine a few more bumps in the road to come but together we can make a massive impact for anyone who works with chemicals or around chemicals in the workplace.

My name is Daryl Lewis I’m 30 year old I live in York and this is my asthma story so far,

The story starts in May 2019 the 10th to be exact, I’m due to start my night shift at a large global brewer I’m a technical operator so just getting having my food just really waiting for my night shift, that same day we had company in and fix a CIP tank as it was leaking chemicals mainly PAA or peracetic acid and at the same time the engineering manager had another company fix the caustic tank as that was leaking also, so they’ve fixed the tank it’s been signed back okay to use by the engineering manager without going down and checking the work that’s been done, this is where my story starts!

I have gone in on my night shift it’s a Thursday night around 23:00-01:00 so early hours Friday morning me and my work buddy or work partner are doing cips on a filter  to make sure everything is clean, so we have gone into the CIP room to get to started at this point we didn’t know both of the tanks are leaking at this point making a chlorinated gas in the room due unfortunately no gas or chemical testers in the cip set, we didn’t know what we was getting our selfs into at this point we’ve gone into this room the room itself is air tight with no ventilation at this point we are overcome with the fumes as it’s a big room it’s taken awhile to get to the point where we are overcome, the first sign eyes are watering, nose is watering and also I can’t breath just coughing a lot so we’ve gone over to the window broke the window open and managed to get air into the room and more importantly air into our body! We have ran out of the room to was our eyes with water and wash our mouths out I’ve managed to finish my nights! The same day I’ve gone into hospital as I’m coughing up blood and feel really really unwell they just said I had burns down my throat and sent me home no further check ups needed, a week later I’ve gone to the GPS saying I’m struggling to breathe after this chemical leak at work he said it’s hay fever reminding that non of my family have hay fever or asthma so he prescribed me becconase nasal spray nothing more! Six visits later nothing happens my condition is getting worse to the point I can’t walk without getting out of breath waking up in the night struggling to breath so I’ve gone back to the GPS for the 8/9 time at this point they think I’m having heart failure this in March 2020 start of the Covid 19 pandemic,

I get rushed into hospital and admitted for suspected heart failure! Then I get sent home with a viral infection and they think I have Covid 19 at York hosptial at this point I’m really struggling to breath and I get signed off work for 3 months, to mention I normally run back to back marathons for charity every year, play football and normally very fit very active I couldn’t walk up stairs without feeling dizzy and breathless I actually thought I was dying and nobody knew what was wrong with me! At this point I’ve tried to hang myself, I had been struggling for year with no help and no diagnoses then my doctor gives me heart tablets or beta blockers which I didn’t know actually makes asthma worse so I was struggling this is the lowest point of my life so far, work then rings me stage one disciplinary meeting due to my sickness, at this point I thought I was going to lose my job because of something I didn’t know what was going on inside of me!

I thought a big company would be helping me not kicking me while I’m down! So fast forward a little to August 2020! Occupational health not my GP refer me to a breathing specialist a hosptial called the royal Brompton more specifically a man called professor paul cullinan and his nurse Julie cannon if it wasn’t for these people I would still be struggling and I can’t thank them enough for helping me, the first thing they do is take me off the beta blockers which I saw a massive improvement and get me a blue inhaler sorted which helped but was still struggling and I return back to work on a phased return baring in mind I still don’t know what’s wrong and im working alone at this point with no help, they start doing tests with me in January 2021 they come up with I have reactive airway disease then finally go on to say I have asthma due to the chemical inhalation at work that night! I also have dysfunctional breathing because my body went into shock so I need physiotherapy to teach my body how to breath again, 

I then find loads of evidence from the maintenance manager saying it was a temporary repair and it had failed it wasn’t fixed properly after I found these emails work admitted it was complete failure of the temporary repair! I’ve have been on a lot of different inhalers 5 so far I’m now trailing my sixth, I’m taking anti depressants and have also been put down that I have PTSD due to the accident at work! I have also gone to the eye specialist at York hosptial He thinks I have blepharitis due to chronic dry eyes caused by the chemicals!

More recently I have been classed as 32% disabled 30% loss of function with my lungs and 2% loss of eye function.

The CIP set was still leaking for at least a year after my accident the room still has no ventilation and still no air testers because they are not mandatory and work will not invest in them because of that reason, 

I'm now using my accident to hopefully change legalisation so it's made compulsory to have air testers around all cip sets, I have made a change it petition to try get it worded differently or make it compulsory to have these safety devices in place.  

This is my story thanks for reading and let’s make a difference so this never happens again 

Thanks again 

Daryl lewis