Social care scandal over virus could have been avoided – The Yorkshire Post says

All care home residents and staff with coronavirus symptoms are finally to be tested as Ministers face a backlash over their neglect of this sector as the public health crisis escalates.

But it should not have taken a national emergency like no other to force Matt Hancock, the Health and Social Care Secretary, to accept his obligations to all those residents who need care assistance in their advancing years.

If Mr Hunt and, in fairness, his predecessor, Jeremy Hunt, had heeded this newspaper’s repeated calls to integrate the provision of critical and social care, as part of one ‘national care service’, the current concerns about testing – and availability of PPE equipment – could, potentially, have been ameliorated.

And while the construction of Nightingale hospitals in Harrogate, London and elsewhere has been a collective effort like no other, an exemplar of public sector co-operation at its very best, where are the Nightingale care homes?

If there were a network of such facilities across the UK where residents suffering from Covid-19 could be looked after, it might lessen the risks to other senior citizens who – with their relatives – are enduring a living nightmare in the hope the virus, an invisible enemy, does not spread.

Rather than grandstanding for the cameras, Mr Hancock needs to put in place a joined-up plan without delay. After all, he is supposed to be the Health – and Social Care – Secretary.

Editor’s note: first and foremost - and rarely have I written down these words with more sincerity - I hope this finds you well.

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James Mitchinson

Editor