A HARLOW care home has responded to comments made by prime minister, Boris Johnson that care homes “didn’t really follow procedures” in responding to the Coronavirus pandemic.

Mr Johnson said: “We discovered too many care homes didn’t really follow the procedures in the way that they could have, but we’re learning lessons the whole time.”

We asked a number of care homes in Harlow to respond.

A spokesperson for Tye Green Lodge said: “Tye Green Lodge has fully followed every iteration of guidance from both the UK Government and Public Health England.

“While this virus is new and we are still learning about how it is spread and how best to prevent it from entering care homes, it is also a fact that guidance has changed on more than 25 occasions since the beginning of this outbreak.

The guidance we are required to follow today is very different from the guidance we were required to follow in March, when our outbreak began, and when official UK Government advice was that staff should only wear masks when residents were showing symptoms and testing was not widely available for our staff or residents, despite our requests at both local and national level. Indeed, it was not until the 13th March that guidance was updated to remove a line which explicitly said that “it is very unlikely that people receiving care in a care home or the community will become infected”. We now know that not to be the case.

“We could not be prouder of our staff team who have done everything in their power to safeguard the people we care for during this unprecedented crisis”.