THE family of a young Shanklin man who died of meningitis have spoken out, saying no lessons have been learnt from his death.

An inquest was held into his death, which concluded he died of natural causes.

However, the family say lessons should be learnt by the 999 triage system, which assessed his call — when he was screaming in pain — as a lower level emergency.

Christopher Davey, 23, of Carter Avenue, Shanklin, began feeling ill on Saturday, October 6.

He was hunched up with a stiff neck, vomiting and had a severe headache.

His sister, Toni Davey-Tiller, phoned an ambulance, which arrived at around 9am, but the ambulance staff decided he did not need to be taken to hospital as his symptoms were indicative of the flu.

However, as his symptoms got worse, Toni phoned 999 again later in the day, but was told an ambulance could not be sent out immediately and an ambulance could take two hours to reach them.

It later transpired that the urgency of his case had been downgraded because of the length of time his symptoms had been ongoing.

Eventually, Toni and her husband decided they could not wait any longer as Christopher started having a seizure, so they carried him to the car and drove him to hospital themselves.

When he arrived at hospital, emergency staff immediately suspected meningitis, intubated him and put him into an induced coma. He never woke up.

The inquest heard that if another patient called with the same symptoms, the same response would be given.

Coroner Caroline Sumeray said that she could not order 999 call handlers to adjust the triage system because if they did, people who really did only have the flu would be put into higher emergency response categories, which could mean delays for patients with life-threatening conditions.

Toni Davey-Tiller said: "As a family, we are disappointed with the outcome of the inquest.

"Although this process is not about blame, it should be about how to move forward.

"Ever since Christopher's death, we have maintained that we do not blame anyone but the system.

"However, it is sad that it was found that there is nothing to learn and no changes have been or will be made.

"This means that, in the future, if somebody were to call with similar circumstances to Chris, then they would die and Chris' death would have been for nothing, something we have been campaigning so hard against.

"More lives shouldn't be lost or put at risk this way, yet there are no lessons learnt.

"We will continue to campaign though to highlight the symptoms of meningitis and how quickly things can change.

"Christopher's life, and death, will mean something."

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