20th October 2020
Covid-19 Care Provider Impact Study, October 2020
National Care Association want to pay tribute to those working in adult social care supporting some of the most vulnerable members of our society. Having lived through unprecedented challenges, they now face the prospect of a second wave in addition to the usual challenges that winter brings.
Our survey indicates that despite levels of improvement in access to critical items like PPE, 67% of providers remain concerned about their ability to continue to operate. The fact that 93% of respondents have indicated that they do not have Covid-19 in their services is a testament to the lessons learnt by providers over the past 6 months.
Testing and Funding remain causes of concerns and clearly the staffing shortages will create substantial pressure on providers if the time lapses in test results continue to be inconsistent. Providers have put funding, testing, insurance and the wellbeing of their staff in their top six major concerns. It should be further noted that providers are increasingly concerned they face challenges on getting cover within their insurances for Covid.
Nara Ahmed OBE, Executive Chairman of National Care Association said:
“The sector remains in a fragile state with very little recognition or support. Short term offers of funding will only act as a sticking plaster on a very deep and infected wound which has received little or no attention in decades. It seem surreal that, despite strong evidence and hard facts, our sector continues to be minimised, ignored and marginalised despite the fact that we contribute over £40 billion to the economy, employ 1.5 million people and have more beds than the NHS! Clearly, the government are not listening and the Social Care voice is being treated with little or no respect.
It should be noted that we have saved many lives in our services and continue to battle to keep our service users safe despite the challenges we face. This pandemic has exposed the neglect our sector has faced in the absence of a voice in Cabinet fighting for us. We believe it is time that Social Care had it own champion, in a Secretary of State for Care, to ensure that we have parity with the voice of our colleagues in the NHS. We want to be robust and sustainable so we can ensure that we can keep the NHS safe by enabling them to support those who have acute care needs whilst we take care of people who have been safely discharged into Social Care. Only then can we develop the world class services we need to fight global threats like this pandemic whilst building strong domestic pathways for our citizens.”
