Isle of Wight community responder Neil Youngs will be among frontline NHS staff attending a birthday church service at St Paul’s Cathedral in London.

It will mark the NHS's 73 years of saving lives and invited staff will be representing colleagues from across the area.

The service coincides with an open letter calling on young Islanders to join the NHS.

Written by Chief Nursing Officer Ruth May, NHS national medical director Professor Stephen Powis and Suzanne Rastrick, the NHS’s Chief Allied Health Professions Officer, it invites people preparing for the world of work and others contemplating a career change to think about joining the “biggest care team in the world”.

There are 25,000 vacancies currently being advertised and many do not require a medical or health background.

Almost 200,000 people took up jobs in the NHS in the last year - a 6.8 per cent rise compared to the year before.

The NHS has also seen a jump in interest for degrees related to healthcare, with medical applications up by a fifth.

Applications for nursing degrees increased by almost a third (to 60,130) for the 2021/22 academic year.

The letter comes ahead of the St Paul’s service, which will be led by the Very Reverend Dr David Ison, Dean of St Paul’s and the Right Reverend and Right Honourable Dame Sarah Mullally, Bishop of London.

Local invitees also include Karen Roberts, Bereavement Services Manager at Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust, Reverend Dawn Banting, Chaplain at Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust, Cherry Brennan, Senior Matron at Solent NHS Trust, Iain Robertson, Catering Manager at Solent NHS Trust and Jake Plummer, a volunteer at Solent NHS Trust.

NHS chief Sir Simon Stevens will deliver an address recognising the dedication and commitment of all those who have played their part in combating coronavirus across the NHS, care sector and beyond.

Dr Ashley Price, a member of the team who treated the very first patients with the coronavirus in this country, and May Parsons, who administered the first vaccine outside of a trial, will take part in the socially distanced service.

Dr Perpetual Uke, a rheumatology consultant from Birmingham who gave birth to twins while in a coma with Covid-19 and Kathrine Dawson, who also gave birth and was in a coma with the virus and whose baby Ruby was born with it, will also have roles in the event.