Denials reiterated during today’s press briefing – but government’s adult social care site still says C+ patients will be discharged to care homes
Government minister Oliver Dowden and his scientific adviser Stephen Powis today repeated the Tories’ persistent denial that the government has knowingly sent confirmed coronavirus sufferers into care homes.
Doctors and care professionals have accused the government of ‘seeding’ the virus among the most vulnerable by doing exactly that – after the SKWAWKBOX broke the news exclusively more than seven weeks ago and the NHS confirmed not only that it was happening, but that it was driven by central government policy.
That didn’t prevent the government’s denials – and it didn’t stop Dowden and Powis today:
But it is still government policy to send confirmed-positive coronavirus sufferers back to care homes. The government’s ‘COVID-19 Action Plan for Social Care‘ on its official gov.uk website (archived this evening here) confirms it.
The ‘action plan’ is specific that the coronavirus status of some people being discharged into care homes is ‘COVID-positive’:
The action plan confirms that this policy has continued even after the public outcry about the care-home situation pushed the government into testing all residents before they are discharged back to homes – they might be tested, but they will still be sent back to care homes before the result is known:
And as the first graphic shows, some who do test positive will also be sent back.
The same document also confirms that asymptomatic people will be discharged – and the language makes clear that they will not only be discharged if they test negative:
And while C-positive patients are now supposed to be ‘isolated’, the document confirms that the government knows that many of the people involved – not all of them elderly – will be suffering from dementia or other mental impairments that will make them difficult to keep in isolation:
Care homes suffering from staff shortages because of the pandemic are unlikely to be able to provide the 24/7 monitoring of multiple patients to ensure that they do not mix with other residents – even if the home has suitable facilities.
And the document still boasts – in spite of the fact that the government has condemned tens of thousands of residents to suffocate to death in care homes not equipped with ventilators, the Department of Health and Social Care still finds time to boast of its ‘successful’ discharge policy and the critical care beds kept empty as a result:
The Tories will, of course, continue to tell the public that this is not happening – in spite of the fact that its own documentation confirms that it is.
And almost none of the ‘mainstream’ media will challenge them adequately and directly enough on it. So it’s up to the independent media and their readers to make sure these facts reach the public consciousness.
(Thank you to Twitter activist @RedRadicals for the help on the groundwork for this article.)
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