Community groups forming in UK to assist in self-isolation
SOURCE: The Gurdian
More than 150 “mutual aid” groups have been formed across the UK to provide support from shopping, dog walking and picking up prescriptions within communities.
The groups, which number at least 174 and are being coordinated nationally by ‘Covid-19 Mutual Aid UK’, have organised online meetings today and are handing out flyers in streets.
As well as practical support the groups are offering telephone calls with people who are self-isolating due to infection or increased vulnerability.
Anna Vickerstaff, one of the coordinators of the national network, said:
Groups are being set up and run entirely by volunteers – and our hope is that they can help to make sure people who need support get it. With the NHS and public services having been so ruthlessly underfunded in the last decade, we really just want to make sure that people don’t end up suffering alone, or without the basics and support that they need from the outside world.
There’s some pretty big questions about whether or not the government’s response to this crisis has been fit for purpose. So it’s even more important that so many ordinary people across the country are keen to offer solidarity to each other in a moment of need.
