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The UK government has said it will work to develop a “clear and scalable programme of psychological support” that could be rolled out if another pandemic occurs.
Responding to recommendations made by the ongoing COVID-19 Inquiry in its module three report — on the effect of the pandemic on healthcare systems — the Department of Health and Social Care and the Cabinet Office said the system would be developed in partnership with NHS organisations, healthcare employers and professional bodies.
It said the plans will include “clear triggers for scaling psychological support, alongside a defined minimum offer available to all staff”.
The pledge came in response to recommendation 10 of the Module 3 report, which said the governments of the UK and devolved nations should work to establish a programme of support during future pandemics, and that this should include peer support visits aimed at hospitals under acute strain.
These visits, the recommendation said, should “collect insights on the pressures that healthcare workers are facing and understand what further support they might need”.
In its response, the government said that local leadership would retain responsibility for ensuring that staff wellbeing was actively supported, and that “we will work with devolved governments to share learning and insight, including on peer support visits”.
A survey conducted by the then Royal Pharmaceutical Society (now the Royal College of Pharmacy) and the charity Pharmacist Support in September and October 2020 found that just under a third (31%) of pharmacists said that the COVID-19 pandemic had impacted their mental health and wellbeing to a significant extent.
During the pandemic, NHS England launched a mental health hotline for staff, including pharmacy teams, offering support in dealing with the pressures of COVID-19. It also opened mental health and wellbeing hubs.
Commenting on the government’s response to recommendation 10 of the inquiry’s report, Amandeep Doll, director for England at the Royal College of Pharmacy, said: “The government’s commitment to psychological support for healthcare workers during future pandemics is welcome, but the lessons of COVID-19 must translate into practical action.
“Pharmacists faced unprecedented pressures during the pandemic, yet community pharmacy teams did not always have the same access to wellbeing support as NHS staff. Any future support programme must be accessible to all pharmacy professionals, regardless of where they work, and be in place from the outset.
“Pharmacy teams must also be properly recognised and included in pandemic planning, workforce protection and preparedness. They played a vital role during COVID-19 and must not be an afterthought in future emergencies.”
In its response to the COVID-19 inquiry report, the government also said it agreed with the need to develop nation-specific mechanisms for publishing data on healthcare worker deaths in the event of a future pandemic, as suggested in recommendation 8 of the report. The government said that during the pandemic, “insufficient data was seen as a reflection that healthcare workers were not being counted or valued, particularly given the increased risks of mortality faced by specific ethnic minority staff in the NHS”.
Pharmacists were among frontline healthcare professionals who died during the pandemic.
The government said it would “take a proportionate, staged approach to implement the recommendation”, and will ask the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to “review guidance around reporting of occupation on death certificates and will explore the feasibility of linking workforce data with death registration data”.
It also said it will work with the ONS, the devolved governments and the UK Statistics Authority to support comparability of data across the UK.
Over time, it added, “more detailed analysis may be needed to understand patterns by role, setting, geography and demographic characteristics”.
