Carers Trust welcomes adoption of its recommendations in UK Government advice for unpaid carers on COVID-19
The Department of Health and Social Care has today released guidance for people providing unpaid care to family or friends.
Carers Trust welcomes adoption of its recommendations in UK Government advice for unpaid carers on COVID-19.
The guidance states that it is “for anyone who cares, unpaid, for a friend or family member who, due to a lifelong condition, illness, disability, serious injury, a mental health condition or an addiction, cannot cope without their support.”
The guidance advises all carers to “create an emergency plan with the person they care for”. It sets out details that will need to go into such a plan like details of ongoing medication and treatment the person with care and support needs is receiving.
Welcoming publication of the guidance, Carers Trust CEO, Gareth Howells, said:
“Carers Trust welcomes the government’s publication of guidance for unpaid carers.
We were pleased to be asked to represent the views of both carers and over 130 local carer services we work with across the UK. And we have worked extremely hard behind the scenes to ensure we heard directly from carers, and that their concerns were fed into development of the guidance. Knowing how COVID-19 was directly affecting unpaid carers meant we were well placed to play such an instrumental role in supporting the Department of Health and Social Care in the development of its guidance, published today.
The guidance will help people who were already facing huge challenges as they cared for family members with often complex needs. Specifically, it will help unpaid carers to know what they can do now to make plans should they, or the person they care for, develop COVID-19.
“Unpaid carers have been disproportionately affected by the Coronavirus crisis. So we will continue to do everything in our power to ensure that what carers and local services need continue to be represented at the highest levels.”
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Coronavirus / Health / UK
