Cathy Gardner, whose father died of Covid-19. Image: PA Cathy Gardner, whose father died of Covid-19. Image: PA THE UK HIGH Court has ruled that Government policies discharging patients from hospital to care homes at the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic were “unlawful”.
They said that, despite there being “growing awareness” of the risk of asymptomatic transmission throughout March 2020, there was no evidence that then-Health Secretary Matt Hancock addressed the issue of the risk to care home residents of such transmission. The drafters of the documents of March 17 and April 2 simply failed to take into account the highly relevant consideration of the risk to elderly and vulnerable residents from asymptomatic transmission. The judges said these issues were not addressed until a further document in mid-April 2020.
Gardner, aged in her 60s and from Sidmouth, Devon, said her father had died at the age of 88 at a care home in Bicester, Oxfordshire, in April 2020. Coppel said other countries, particularly in the Far East, had shown the way to safeguard residents by stopping the virus getting into care homes.