Healthcare Workers Express Fears About Impact of Pandemic on Services

Amidst concerns reported today that an increase in the time many ambulances spent waiting outside emergency departments over Christmas has created a number of “secondary COVID victims”, YouGov this week published polling on how healthcare workers feel the pandemic has affected the care provided to patients.

According to the data 40% of NHS healthcare staff feel that the quality of patient care in their workplace has fallen compared to before the pandemic. YouGov notes that “this includes some 10% who say patient care quality is now “much lower” than normal.” 42% however said the quality of care had not changed, with 4% saying it had improved.

In contrast, 60% of the private sector healthcare workers questioned said the quality of care had not changed as a result of the pandemic, with a further 20% saying the quality of care had fallen.

Among staff caring for patients with chronic or long-term health conditions, 17% said they have “much less” time to give each patient the attention required. 19% said they had “somewhat less” time, with 9% saying they had more time that were needed.

Among staff working with COVID-19 patients, 14% said they have much less time than is needed to care for them, with 21% saying they had somewhat less time and 12% saying they have more than enough time.

YouGov goes on to note that: “Staff caring for people with acute or short-term health problems report similar constraints, with 13% saying they have much less time than needed, while a fifth (22%) are somewhat short. One in ten (10%) have more time than they need.”

Asked about how the pandemic is affecting patients with conditions other than COVID-19, such as cancer, 48% of healthcare workers were very fearful about how the pandemic was affecting them, with 44% saying they were somewhat fearful.

Among those NHS workers who responded, 91% said normal services continue to suffer from some level of disruption due to the pandemic.

In a further poll YouGov has reported that 14% of NHS staff have been redeployed to carry out other duties outside of their normal job as a result of the pandemic.

In more optimistic news however, data compiled by Ipsos Mori has found that Britons are the most likely of anyone in the world to want to donate excess COVID-19 vaccines to other countries that need it. It finds that 69% of those in the UK who were questioned want this to happen. In contrast, in the United States, that figure stands at 46%.

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