A recent BBC article looks at how life has changed dramatically since the start of the coronavirus pandemic. There has been an enormous human and financial cost – and its impact has also been felt in many other ways.

Four correspondents in the article look at the impact of the pandemic in numbers – from cancelled operations to school days lost and a rise in benefit claimants.

The four key areas that have been impacted are:

• Health and the NHS
• Law and Society
• Education and Family
• Poverty and Welfare

But what does this data mean and how does it impact social care?

Health and the NHS

This portion of the article particularly focuses on the deaths surge caused by the virus. They look at the patterns emerging in the death statistics and find that people from poorer backgrounds and those from ethnic minorities are both at a significantly higher risk of death. A key factor that influences this is that people from these communities are more likely to work in jobs where they see the public. With this in mind we need to prepare for the impact this will have on our workforce and also consider how we can better protect our workforce to reduce their risk of contracting the virus as a high percentage of the social care workforce is made up of people from these communities.

Law and Society

This portion of the article focuses mainly on how laws and regulations have had to change in response to the virus in order to keep people safe. Social Care will be specifically impacted by the movement of carer regulations that have been proposed and are likely to come in to place in the near future. The proposed regulations are going to present challenges to organisations and their recruitment partners. Our role is to support our customers through this and ensure a smooth transition, especially when there is already a skills shortage in adult social care where 1 in 11 vacancies are left uncovered – we aim to ensure our customers continue to have enough staff to provide a safe service.

Education and Family

This part of the article focuses on school closures and mental health issues that have arisen as a result of the pandemic. Good mental health is vital for children and young people to flourish, but research suggests that during the pandemic this has worsened. Schools act as a place of safety and routine for children, providing structure and certainty to their lives. With this being completely turned upside down, both boys and girls were affected causing uncertainty and loneliness. With more and more children and young people falling into the mental health category, in Social Care, we need to gear up our services to support not only the children who need it but their families too who are likely to be a part of our wider workforce.

Poverty and Welfare

The final portion of the article looks at poverty and welfare and specifically the increase in benefit claims as a result of the pandemic. As with the studies done on children and young people affected by the school closures, research has shown that mental health amongst adults has worsened considerably during 2020 with now over 16% of adults showing signs of depression. Similarly to before, as a sector, we need to gear up our services to support those with mental health issues and also ensure that we are consistently looking out for the wellbeing of our wider workforce.

How can AJ help?

We want to let you know that we are here to support you, and if you would like to discuss the findings in the above report, or about how we can collaborate, please let us know. To get in touch, email Jo Guy on [email protected].

As a specialist, family-run recruitment business, we provide a proactive and consultative approach to recruitment. We help organisations to target issues such as continuity of staffing, reducing spend where you have a high volume of agency usage and supporting those who have specific talent requirements or are in hard to fill locations. We can help with any immediate staffing requirements or longer-term recruitment projects to ultimately save you time and money on agency spend.

Click here to see what our clients say about how we have supported them throughout the pandemic.