Launch of Local Coronavirus Action Group

BY JOHN WAKE

THE Harlow Coronavirus People Before Profit Action Group has been formed to raise concerns about the mismanagement of the COVID-19 crisis by the government. The Group is critical of the delay in introducing “lockdown” to prevent the spread of infection; the lack of protection for NHS staff, care home staff, and other key workers; the absence of a test, trace, and isolate policy; and the recent decision to “ease” the lockdown by encouraging the reopening of schools and a return to work in manufacturing and construction industries, particularly for the lower paid.

The focus of the group is on activities, even if it is just from the safety of their own homes. At the first meeting last week (held online) members reported on activities in which they had already been engaged, such as calls for adequate PPE at the Thursday night “clap for the NHS”, and a convoy of cars and a socially distanced demonstration outside the hospital on International Workers Memorial Day.

A Facebook page has been set up at: https://www.facebook.com/HarlowCoronavirusPeopleBeforeProfitActionGroup, and the activity for the first week was to post selfies holding a poster with the words, “No mass return to school or work until it is safe”.

The main item on the agenda at the second (virtual) meeting this week was the issue of the terrible toll (at least 8000) of care home deaths. Until recently these were not accounted for in the government figures and, even now, many deaths of elderly people are not attributed to COVID-19 because testing has not been made available.

Tom Topley, a member of the group, said: “The Coronavirus pandemic has exposed the national scandal of the situation in our care homes and the little regard shown to residents and staff”.

He recalled a campaign by Harlow Pensioners Action Group, which he joined shortly after retiring from work in 2003. The pensioners were objecting to the sell-off of care homes, by Essex County Council, to private companies.

Essex County Councillor Jenny Holland said at the time that “This is about selling our elderly to the highest bidder”. “She was right”, said Mr Topley.

He also referred to the press cutting that he still has from that time [see copy below], quoting Les Coben, Chairman of the Pensioners Action Group, who said: “people will die from what they are doing…not next week or next month, but it won’t be long.”

Mr Topley said that the term “care homes” is a misnomer as the residents and staff were abandoned by private owners and by government. The Coronavirus Action Group meeting backed Mr Topley’s call for care homes to be brought back into public ownership as part of a national care service.

Another member of the group, Pat Kyrou, who is the Health and Safety Officer on the District Committee of West Essex NEU (National Education Union), added that she felt that the issue of inadequate protective equipment and, in particular, a lack of testing, had been a major contributory factor in the deaths in care homes. She said that the situation is very different in Canada (where her brother is a doctor).

Residents of care homes in Canada are isolated for fourteen days upon admission, whether or not they are displaying symptoms of the virus. This is in marked contrast to the practice in this country.

Ms Kyrou quoted from a document published by the Department of Health and Social Care, Public Health England, and NHS England, entitled “Admission and Care of Residents during COVID-19 Incident in a Care Home”. This document states that “negative tests are not required prior to transfer /admissions into the care home” from home or hospital, and that upon discharge from hospital, residents showing no symptoms should be provided with “care as normal”. The document also states that: “Care home staff who come into contact with a COVID-19 patient while not wearing PPE can remain at work. This is because in most instances this will be a short-lived exposure…”

The Action Group regards this guidance as disgraceful, given that it is known that people can pass on the virus without necessarily exhibiting symptoms immediately, and that the press has recently reported that care home staff are dying at twice the rate of hospital staff.

The members of the Action Group expressed shock and sorrow at the recently reported deaths of 17 residents and a member of staff at Tye Green Lodge Care Home in Harlow. A member of the group said that he has spoken to workers at other homes in the town who are very worried that they have not been provided with adequate protection.

Tom Topley expressed the mood of the meeting in his concluding remarks: “If we are all in this together then we all have to fight for change. Our elderly people deserve better than to be left to die as they have been”. ■