Covid bereaved angry as UK Inquiry condemns how the pandemic was managed in care homes

Martin Shipton

Covid Bereaved Families for Justice Cymru has accused former Welsh Labour ministers of hiding behind scientific advice over failures to protect care home residents during the pandemic.

The group was responding to a UK Covid-19 Inquiry report which concluded that government failures had allowed the virus to “spread like wildfire” in care homes.

It said the findings exposed a gap between the assurances given to the people of Wales and what the Welsh Government was able to deliver.

Then First Minister Mark Drakeford said on March 3, 2020, that the government was “very alert” to the risks facing older people in care homes.

Yet between March and May 2020, 1,729 patients were discharged from Welsh hospitals into care homes, with the overwhelming majority of those discharged during the earliest phase of the pandemic not having been tested.

As late as the end of April, untested and Covid-positive patients were being discharged into these settings.

The inquiry identified limited testing capacity as a reason for the failure to test patients before discharge. The campaign group said this challenged the explanation that decisions had simply followed scientific advice.

In a statement, it said: “Why was testing capacity insufficient? Why were statements made to the Senedd suggesting there was no value in testing care home residents? Why were the people of Wales not given a clear and honest explanation of the limitations facing the government? These questions demand answers.

“And the failures went far beyond testing. Wales entered the pandemic with inadequate preparedness, known weaknesses in social care planning and insufficient national information about care home capacity. Lessons from previous pandemic exercises had not been properly implemented. Restrictions on care staff working across multiple settings were delayed until August 2020, and enhanced sick pay was not introduced until November.

“These were not unforeseeable problems. They were weaknesses that should have been addressed before the crisis struck.”

The group also pointed to former Health Minister Vaughan Gething’s acknowledgement that more could have been done on capacity and contingency planning. He described the delay in introducing isolation requirements for discharged patients as unnecessary.

‘Angry’

Catherine Griffiths, of Covid Bereaved Families for Justice Cymru, said: “We are angry. We are devastated. And we are tired of having to fight for answers that should have been forthcoming years ago.

“We believe the people of Wales were misled, and we want to know who knew what, when they knew it, and why these failures were allowed to happen.

“Care home residents were left exposed. Families lost loved ones. Care workers were left facing impossible circumstances. Meanwhile, known weaknesses in preparedness and planning had not been addressed.

“The science must not be used as a political shield. If the Welsh Government lacked the capacity to test, it must answer for that failure. If assurances given to the public were misleading, that must be exposed. And if decisions put vulnerable lives at risk, those decisions must be examined fully.”

The group said the inquiry’s Module 6 report provided a factual account but did not go far enough in examining responsibility. It wanted further scrutiny of ministerial statements, hospital discharge decisions and the delays in introducing protections for residents and care workers.

Sam Smith-Higgins, also of Covid Bereaved Families for Justice Cymru, said: “We will not accept another process that simply lists what went wrong and leaves the most important questions unanswered. We need a statutory Wales Covid Inquiry with the legal powers to compel evidence, establish responsibility and hold decision-makers to account.”

Statutory inquiry

The campaigners challenged Plaid Cymru to honour the position it had taken while in opposition, arguing that the proposed £10m review would lack the powers needed to investigate the Welsh Government’s response fully.

They said families in Wales should have access to the same form of statutory inquiry as those in Scotland.

The group’s statement concluded: “After years of campaigning, bereaved families will not accept a watered-down process that fails to deliver meaningful accountability.”

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