A Rail Worker Died Of The Coronavirus After Being Spat At By A Man Who Said He Had COVID-19

A member of staff at London’s Victoria station died of the coronavirus after being spat at by a man who said he had COVID-19.

Belly Mujinga, 47, a mother to an 11-year-old daughter, was working on the concourse of the station on March 22 when the man spat and coughed on her and a colleague.

“The man asked her what she was doing, why she was there, and she said they were working,” her husband Lusamba Gode Katalay said. “The man said he had the virus and spat on them. They reported it to their supervisor. Belly came home and told me everything.”

Within days, both women fell ill. Mujinga’s condition grew worse, and on April 2 she was taken to Barnet Hospital by ambulance, where she was put on a ventilator. She died three days later, 14 days after she was assaulted at Victoria.

Mujinga had an underlying respiratory condition, which she had taken time off work with in the past. The last time her husband saw her was when she was taken away in the ambulance, and just ten people were allowed to attend her funeral, in line with current UK government guidelines.

British Transport Police are now investigating the incident, while Mujinga’s trade union, the TSSA, has criticised her employer for putting her to work on the frontline.

Manuel Cortes, TSSA general secretary, said he was “shocked and devastated at Belly’s death,” and “she is one of far too many frontline workers who have lost their lives to coronavirus.”