Coronavirus crisis in care homes is a national scandal

Re: Do Not Resuscitate order at Care Homes Sparks Concerns (Eastbourne Herald May 1 click here to read).

Concerns! This is beyond ‘concerns’. It is revolting, a disgrace and a national scandal, that will leave a stain on this period of our history.

In our community, people have been left to die, simply because of a judgement made about their age and condition.

And this to a generation, that we shall venerate in the VE commemorations.

This is not the fault of individuals in the system who are doing their best. It is the fault of a underfunded, neglected and broken social care system.

Government identified ‘Pandemic’ as the number one risk to the UK. Despite this, there has been no national discussion, no public policy debate and no public policy, as to what the response would be should a pandemic occur.

And it has, and we see, across health, care and the economy, a series of ill considered and unplanned measures being introduced as a result of an absence of planning.

And the treatment of our old, particularly those in social care, is the most scandalous aspect of this planning failure. It will feature highly in the national enquiry that must result, when the immediate crisis abates.

In the meantime, I would invite Caroline Ansell MP, who I believe to be a warm-hearted and decent person, to work on a cross party basis with for instance, Peter Kyle (MP for Hove), who first alerted the country to what was going on in the Cinderella social care sector.

Caroline writes in the same edition of the Herald, that the ‘Coronavirus situation in our care homes remains a challenge’. That’s glib, and not enough.

As an MP for a constituency with a high percentage of social care provision for the elderly she, on a cross party basis, needs to be proactive with Ministers and colleagues, making sure that provision is as dignified as it can be now, and that resource flows freely to ensure that that happens.

As importantly though, she and all of us, whether we are young or old, woman or man need to ensure that this can never happen again.

We need to insist and demand that social care policy, resourcing and provision,enables people to look forward to old age, secure in the knowledge that when the time comes, we can die with the dignity that life deserves, and with the full love, compassion and care of the state. A state into which we have made our financial and emotional investment.

Nothing less will do!