Care home deaths 'could add thousands' to virus toll
A study of deaths linked to Covid-19 in care homes predicts that thousands more people have died than official figures show.
The National Care Forum (NCF), which represents not-for-profit care providers, has estimated that more than 4,000 people may have died after contracting Covid-19 across all residential and nursing homes before April 13.
This is significantly higher than the official weekly figures released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which recorded 217 care home deaths connected to the virus up until April 3.
The NCF collected data from 47 care homes which support more than 30,000 people across the UK, accounting for 7.4% of the care sector population.
It found 299 confirmed or suspected Covid-19 deaths across those specific homes in one week between April 7 to April 13, which is almost three times the number of deaths in the preceding month, when they found 102 deaths between March 6 and April 7.
When scaled up to reflect the UK's care home population, the NCF estimated that 4,040 people may have died of a coronavirus-related illness before April 13.
Vic Rayner, executive director of the NCF, said: "Quite simply, so long as groups such as residents in care services are omitted from the real-time national reporting on the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, the Government will surely be unable to properly plan for how to protect its people or exit this crisis."
Published: by Radio NewsHub