Think of the elderly and spare the NHS

IT IS worrying to have it confirmed that older people in Wales tend to believe their voices are ignored when decisions are made affecting the communities in which they live.

The survey from Age Cymru comes at a time when older people should be at the forefront of consideration.

The coronavirus poses a disproportionate danger to the mortality of older people, and it is vital that their well-being is at the centre of decisions that are made.

We have to acknowledge that dealing with a pandemic of this kind is not easy.

To a large extent, the rules are having to be made up as we go along – and that’s an explanation for the variety of responses seen in different countries.

But we know that older people and those with underlying health conditions – more often than not the same cohort – are at greater risk than the population as a whole, and therefore deserve priority attention.

Those who are infirm should be kept out of harm’s way as much as possible.

And it makes sense for schools to try to remain open, at least while the majority of parents are still working away from home.

Otherwise, the burden of looking after children would often fall on grandparents, for whom contracting the coronavirus poses a greater risk.

We know that the NHS in Wales is under pressure.

Mercifully, we are going into the second half of March and emerging from winter.

In normal circumstances that would see a decline in the number of critical pneumonia cases affecting older people.

But with the coronavirus providing an additional huge challenge, we must do everything we can to ensure that NHS Wales can cope.

The decision to cancel many planned operations to provide greater capacity for dealing with those who contract the virus is not an ideal situation, but a pragmatic one.

It is crucial that no-one’s life is endangered as a consequence of operations being cancelled, and we trust that decisions will be taken with that in mind.

All of us have a responsibility to ensure that we minimise the risk of our contracting the virus by washing our hands thoroughly and by keeping away as much as humanly possible from clinical settings, including GP surgeries and hospital accident and emergency departments.