COVID-19 – Coronavirus – stay safe!

6th April 2020

Updated April 6th 2020

Headlines

Updates in Gloucestershire

IMPORTANT CLARIFICATION: signs have been put on some benches across the county saying they have been ‘closed’ following advice from the county council. This is not correct. The county council has given no such advice and these signs should be removed. People can use benches as long as they follow Government social distancing guidance.

Reminder: the community help hub helpline is open 8am-8pm on weekdays and 9am-4pm on weekends or visit: www.gloucestershire.gov.uk/help-hub
Gloucestershire County Council has secured dedicated free parking for NHS staff in Cheltenham and Gloucester
Six community transport operators have been given a one-off payment of £100,000 by Gloucestershire County Council to ensure vulnerable residents continue to access services

Adult Social Care

From Monday 6 April the Adult Social Care teams will be operating seven days a week from 8 am to 8 pm.

The number of locality offices that staff are working from will be reduced as will the number of staff that will be working in the office. Staff will now work from two hubs, one in Shire Hall, Gloucester and the other in Redwood House, Stroud.

These hubs will have a small group of key staff working to triage referrals and decision making and will have additional support from other colleagues are working at home to undertake visits if necessary and telephone contact.

There are no changes to the referral route, all referrals should continue to me made via the Adult Help Desk 01452 426868.

National updates

How the government intends to scale up testing programmes to provide a test to anyone who needs one.

Testing is a key pillar of our strategy to protect the NHS and save lives. Our ultimate ambition is that anyone who needs a test should have one.

The government’s testing strategy lays out how we intend to scale up our testing programmes to deliver on this ambition.

Local authorities in England handed new powers to hold public meetings virtually by using video or telephone

The government has announced a £3 million fund for organisations redistributing safe surplus food to those who need it.

Guidance for children’s social care services– Advice about coronavirus for local authorities and their partners.

School closures – Added information about safeguarding. Updated information about workforce and critical workers.

A new Coronavirus Status Checker will help the NHS coordinate its response and build up additional data on the COVID-19 outbreak.

Health, care and volunteer workers parking pass and concessions

Data sharing during this public health emergency -Health and care information will be vital in our response to coronavirus. We must continue to use it well and inform the public to maintain and build trust.

World’s largest trial of potential coronavirus treatments rolled out across the UK

£20 million for ambitious technologies to build UK resilience following coronavirus outbreak

How GCSEs, AS & A levels will be awarded in summer 2020 – Ofqual sets out details for schools, colleges, students, parents & carers.

Updates in Gloucestershire

Your questions answered

Gloucestershire Fire and Rescue Service (GFRS)

What measures are being taken by the Fire Service to ensure that preventative visits can continue with officers and members of the public being equally protected?

GFRS have had to adapt and restrict the way in which we approach prevention activities during the COVID-19 pandemic. GFRS have done this by prioritising ‘very high risk’ members of the community to ensure they are still visited. The fire service will continue to undertake limited prevention activity on a risk based approach.

Those classified as ‘very high risk’ are vulnerable people we are already aware of that we know may not have a working smoke alarm, or are prone to specific threat such as arson or hate crimes.

Where a visit does take place, we are using minimal staff with appropriate safety provisions to mitigate risk to the firefighter and the member of the community. It’s important for us to bear in mind that many of those we continue to visit will be elderly with underlying health issues and must be protected from infection.

For any visit that we have regrettably had to be delay or postpone, GFRS will be sending personal letters to each address explaining the reasons why it has been cancelled and that any visits will be rescheduled. Fire safety information and advice is enclosed with each letter.

The fire safety advice line will temporarily be staffed in day time hours, by our dedicated fire safety team who will be able to offer further advice/support over the phone.

GFRS are continuing to share fire safety messages and these have been tailored accordingly to related to household activity whilst more people are at home. This will continue over the coming weeks and months.