Row over moving the elderly from hospital to care homes
AFURIOUS row has broken out between senior politicians over the policy of discharging elderly people from hospital into care homes as the coronavirus pandemic approached - without knowing if they had the disease.
In mid-March, hospitals across the country were ordered to free-up space in order to maximise critical care capacity for the wave of Covid-19 patients that were expected to hit the NHS.
However, it was not until April 15 that the government required all patients being sent to care homes to be tested - and in the intervening month around 25,000 patients in England made the move from the wards into the care sector.
Lancashire County Council’s Conservative cabinet member for adult services, Graham Gooch, defended what he described as a “big decision” by the government to protect the NHS when appearing before a meeting of the authority’s internal scrutiny committee.
“It was quite clear that if the strain was to be removed from hospitals, it had to go somewhere - it would not simply disappear. So people were discharged from hospital, including those who had Covid, but did not need or would not benefit from acute hospital care,” County Coun Gooch said.
However, Labour’s deputy opposition group leader, John Fillis, demanded to know how many Lancashire residents had “died prematurely” as a result of the practice.
“The Conservatives knowingly chose to transfer vulnerable elderly people out of hospital into care homes without testing - who may have been Covid positive. These vulnerable people subsequently died and may have caused crossinfection in the homes,” County Coun Fillis said.
County Coun Gooch said it was difficult to quantify exactly how many died as a result of Covid - and accused his questioner of making a “political point”.
Last month bosses at Haslingden Hall Care Home which saw 11 residents lose their lives following an outbreak, said 15 NHS hospital patients had been discharged into the Helmshore home without tests for the virus.
And back in May Crawshall Hall Nursing Home, in Crawshawbooth, said a Covid-19 patient had been discharged from hospital to the home before an outbreak which saw three residents die.
An investigation by Lancs Live has found that hundreds of patients with coronavirus were discharged from Lancashire hospitals into care homes during the height of the pandemic, with dozens testing positive within 48 hours of leaving hospital grounds. A Freedom of Information request revealed that from March to June, three of Lancashire’s hospital trusts discharged a total of 267 Covid positive patients into care homes around the county. However, East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust was among two of the county’s five hospital trusts to not reveal its numbers, saying they did not hold them.
The government has previously said that the number of people being discharged from hospitals declined between January and March this year.