Coronavirus diary, Thursday 14 May

Headlining the care home crisis

When the inevitable public inquiry into the coronavirus pandemic is held - and it must not take years as so many have in the past - one subject that will most worry the government is care homes.

After weeks of non stop criticism from care home residents, distraught families and the media, anger is at its fiercest. And it appears to be justified. The elderly and most vulnerable have been cruelly neglected, leading to what has even been described as a massacre.

The figures speak for themselves. Nearly 10,000 care home residents have died, according to the Office for National Statistics,  although the figure is thought to be much higher. In one week this month care home deaths accounted for forty percent of all deaths. In Wales, 1,000 have died.

The government is being blamed for a catalogue of errors: ignoring the obvious danger, not providing protective equipment for homes and carers and not providing testing. The most contentious and startling allegation is that they sent infected hospital patients to their death by discharging them to under-stress care homes without checking it was safe to do so. This put other residents at great risk. 

They are also accused of hiding the extent of the disaster by not releasing the number of care home deaths for weeks. The chief executive of the Alzheimer's Society said it was tragically clear that care homes, where up to seventy percent had dementia, were left to fend for themselves. 

As a resident in Sunrise, the reason why, so far, we have not had cases may be because it is residential, not a nursing home. We take relief and assurance from the Sunrise preparations and plans on which we have been kept up to date.

Sadly, this has not been the case in many care homes, through no fault of their own. It must be agony for those who have lost loved ones -  parents and grandparents. They want answers but it may be years, and a public inquiry, before they get them.