Oldham GP delves into death data to discover Government 'discharged responsibilities to the old'

New figures appear to confirm that national health campaigner Dr Zahid Chauhan OBE’s early lockdown warnings that problems would result from patients being discharged from hospitals back to care homes without a COVID test, came tragically true.

The Oldham GP has previously criticised the premature discharge of sickly patients into the community, which leaves surgeries to pick-up the slack and often send them back, immediately.

But he admits he was 'horrified' when he learned that patients had been dismissed without any COVID tests at the beginning of the pandemic, putting the lives of other residents and the staff that look after them at peril.

“In my position as local councillor and GP, I visited many care homes during the initial lockdown,” said Dr Chauhan.

"And two things struck me.

"The dedication of the staff some of whom were staying in the homes and putting their lives at risk and the fact that patients should never have been removed from hospital without any kind of risk assessment.

"It seems the lives of the vulnerable and the low-paid have no value.”  

Figures released by health watchdog the Care Quality Commission record that the highest number of deaths in care homes occurred during quarter one – the first wave of COVID-19.

Those early days of the pandemic were also marked by a chronic lack of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) with Dr Chauhan observing some care home staff having to resort to the use of plastic bags to keep themselves guarded against the virus.

“That was indeed a shameful chapter,” he added.

"The country had clearly been left totally unprepared for a pandemic.

"PPE eventually made its way to the NHS frontline, but it seemed like an eternity until our colleagues in care got the same.”  

Dr Chauhan organised the first-ever vaccine clinic for the homeless and also developed a risk register for assessing NHS staff roles during COVID.

He said: “I was asked constantly about people from BAME backgrounds and why I believed they were more susceptible to the virus.

"Whilst some talked about genetic predilection or the failure of the NHS to get their messages through to this group, the real cause once again was vulnerability, living in squalid multioccupancy housing and being given scant health resources.

"As with the old, they did not seem worth caring about as far as our government was concerned.”

Health inequalities like these are the subject of a forthcoming book by Dr Chauhan, which shows discrepancies between provision in rural and town areas and young and old, plus a postcode lottery when it came to the quality of healthcare.

“I hope history records that truthfully this government failed spectacularly when it came to coping with the coronavirus and that the first wave was just an exercise in ignoring the science, hoping the whole thing would go away and believing that some lives matter more than others,” added Dr Chauhan.

“What I would like to see is a full enquiry into the handling of social care during COVID-19 especially at the beginning of the pandemic where too many lives were needlessly lost.

"We also need to see a reduction in the health inequalities that are, quite literally, killing people.”

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