Responding to yesterday's Downing Street press briefing, Niall Dickson, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, which represents organisations across the healthcare sector, said:

"This is so important because frontline charities play a crucial role in supporting the NHS.

“Hospices in particular are on the front line – lifeline support for them is a such a relief as they are a vital part of our healthcare system. 

“However, we are still worried about the fragile state of social care on which a lot of this NHS effort depends.

“Extra funding for local government on top of what has already been announced, as well as extra help for private social care providers, may not sound like a priority for the NHS but health leaders tell us that it is. Every penny spent on social care and on community health services will be critical to the NHS’s ability to deliver care and defeat the virus over the next few months.

“All of this shows more clearly than ever, the close dependencies in these public services. What happens in care homes, in the homes of the vulnerable, in mental health institutions, matters to hospitals and they are equally on the front line. Everyone is dependent in some way on everyone else – more than ever we need everyone, including the state, to recognise this. Today was an important step in the right direction.”
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