AALIYAH

This is Aaliyah outside St Georges Hospital in Tooting, where she works as a "Flusher." A flusher checks that the water in the hospital is safe. Taps that are not often used in places like hospitals can contain water that carries Legionella and Pseudomonas bacteria. It's Aaliyah's responsibility as part of the water safety team to ensure that this does not happen. She loves the job, but Covid has been challenging for Aaliyah. She has to wear full PPE all day, which she finds exhausting, and like most 18 year-olds, it's also been awful for her social life.

She did not enjoy school and was placed in a pupil referral unit when she was 13. She left without any qualifications, but when she was 17, she re-sat her exams and now, alongside her full-time job at the hospital, studies law. Equality, diversity, and human rights are important to Aaliyah. She hopes that one day her training in law will help her to help other people. This is very personal to her as she has Paranoid Schizophrenia and wants to prove that people with mental health issues can achieve and work. Aaliyah was recently awarded a 'Mayor of Merton Award' for raising money within the community during the pandemic. She's lived in Tooting and Mitcham her whole life and is engaged to the childhood sweetheart that she has known since she was thirteen. She relaxes by writing songs and boxing. She told me that it's easy to take off the fingernails before she puts the boxing gloves on.