A SOCIAL care champion has said care homes in Gwent felt they were caught up in a nightmare “experiment” when Covid struck in 2020.

Mary Wimbury, chief executive of Care Forum Wales, was speaking after the first week of the UK Covid-19 inquiry's hearings into how the pandemic was handled in Wales.

The inquiry heard this week that many untested hospital patients had been discharged into care homes in Wales, leading to the deaths of many vulnerable elderly residents.

Ms Wimbury said: “During those early weeks, we were talking to our counterparts in care associations across the United Kingdom and I think all of us felt the focus was very much on the NHS and there wasn’t sufficient focus on care homes in particular.

“We felt more planning could have been done in advance in relation to the different types of pandemics and how we would react to them.

“It’s definitely the case we were pressing for testing in particular for people being admitted to care homes from hospitals before that was implemented.

“While testing was announced earlier in England but we were also hearing from counterparts in England was that, although it had been announced, it wasn’t necessarily happening on the ground because the infrastructure wasn’t there."

She added: “At the time it felt very much like we were living in an experiment and we were finding out about the disease as we went along.

“It was the sector’s worst possible nightmare because the virus was most dangerous to frail elderly people

“We started asking questions in February 2020 about preparations in terms of the care sector and it became clear in the early days of the pandemic in the March that we needed an extension of testing and access to sufficient PPE for staff working in the social care sector, as well as funding to implement the infection control  measures that were necessary.

“There were gradual steps as different measures were introduced. Initially, we go the extension of testing for new admissions to care homes and for symptomatic care home residents.

“At the start there was a rule that you could only test five people in a care home and once you had five tests you couldn’t have any more. Clearly, that didn’t make sense going forward.

“Then we moved on to testing all staff and residents when there was an outbreak and finally to all residents and staff being tested regularly.”

“What the inquiry gives us an opportunity to do is to think about what could have been done better in advance so that, heaven forbid, if we were to have another pandemic in future we can be better prepared.”

The Welsh Government has declined to comment on inquiry matters while the hearings are ongoing.