Families allowed to visit ‘Covid-secure’ care homes after about-turn on guidelines

CARE HOME visits will be allowed during lockdown, new government guidance has revealed, as long as families stay behind floor-to-ceiling screens or stay in visiting pods.

The Department of Health and Social Care released an edict last month telling thousands of care homes in England in areas with the highest rate of Covid-19 to restrict visits to “exceptional circumstances only, such as end of life”.

However, following mounting pressure from care home managers and charities, the Government has about-turned on its guidance, announcing that it will relax rules ahead of the second national lockdown starting today.

Under the new guidance, released yesterday, the DHSC said that safe care home visits should be facilitated and tailored to residents.

It also urged care homes to create Covid-secure opportunities for families to meet using visiting arrangements such as “floor-to-ceiling screens”, “visiting pods”, which act as a separate space outside of the care home to facilitate visits, and “window visits”. One care home manager welcomed the announcement, saying “this is the first time there’s been a smile on my face in a while”.

However, a charity chief executive criticised the “prison-style screen” system as “completely missing the point”.

According to the latest available data from the Office for National Statistics, more than 18,000 people have so far died from confirmed or suspected Covid-19 in UK care homes.

Kate Lee, chief executive officer at the Alzheimer’s Society, said: “We’re devastated by today’s new care home visitor guidance – it completely misses the point: this attempt to protect people will kill them... our support line is inundated with distraught families reporting the damaging side effects of isolation on their loved ones.

“The prison-style screens the Government proposes – with people speaking through phones – are frankly ridiculous when you consider someone with advanced dementia can often be bed-bound and struggling to speak.

“They won’t understand and will be distressed by what’s going on around them. Aside from the naive assumption that care homes have the resource, the space, and time to build these screens. Distraught families will read this news and despair.

“We have the tools. How is it possible to test the whole of Liverpool yet not deliver testing and equipment to allow family carers to visit safely? Anything less is unacceptable.”

Caroline Abrahams, charity director at Age UK, added that the new guidance was “too restrictive”.

“In practice we fear it will result in many care homes halting meaningful visiting altogether, because they will be unable to comply with the requirements laid down,” she said.

In contrast, Anita Astle, managing director of Wren Hall Nursing Home in Nottinghamshire, said of the new guidance: “That has put a smile on my face for a change... It’s really exciting, we’ll be delighted to get it going.”

Guidance for people defined as “clinically extremely vulnerable” was also published – t wo days l ater than expected and just hours before the start of the four-week lockdown in England.

People in this group are strongly advised to stay at home at all times, unless they are going out for exercise or a doctor’s appointment. They are also advised to try to stay two metres away from people within their household.

The DHSC also announced that plans are being developed to allow specific family and friends to visit care homes supported by testing, with trials set to begin later this month.

A new national programme for weekly testing of professionals who regularly visit care homes, including community nurses and physiotherapists, will also be rolled out in the coming weeks.

However, despite backing down on its restrictive guidance for care home visits, the Government refused to modify its ban on communal worship. The Government said it “wasn’t possible to go any further” than permitting private prayer in places of worship.

‘In practice we fear it will result in many care homes halting meaningful visiting altogether’