COVER STORY
The second coming of Covid? As the UK faces a ‘second wave’ of Covid-19, Kathy Oxtoby looks at what preparations are, and should be, in place and potential challenges for the health and care sector
“P
erilous turning point”, “invisible enemy”, “inevitable”. This is the language describing the second wave of Covid-19, voiced by the Prime Minister Boris Johnson, reported by the media, and disseminated to a population that has faced so many U-turns in strategies to limit the spread of the virus that it’s hard to predict what the next turn will be. But while the narrative of what measures are required to tackle the virus is constantly changing, one constant has been the likelihood of a second surge of Covid-19. The UK is “now seeing a second wave”, Johnson said in September, adding: “It’s been inevitable we’d see it in this country.” This second wave – a widespread transmission of the virus throughout communities across the whole UK – was predicted by the vast majority of doctors in England in September. A poll by the British Medical Association showed that 86% of more than 8,000 doctors and medical students believed a second peak was ‘likely’ or ‘very likely’ in the next six months. The survey also found that a second peak is the number one concern among clinicians who want to avoid a return to the “horror and tragedy” of the early days of the pandemic.
Plan for the worst Dr Ahmed Shahrabani, co-founder of digital staff bank Locum’s Nest and a junior doctor who recently rejoined the NHS workforce during Covid-19, says: “We only have to look at our neighbours on the continent who adopted a similar strategy to us in combatting the virus. “France and Spain have seen significant rebound rates in confirmed cases, surpassing anything seen in the first wave of the virus. It is therefore prudent for us to plan for the worst, however high our hopes remain,” he says.
HealthInvestor UK • September/October 2020
Lessons were thought to have been learnt in places like care homes, and infection control is said to have improved in hospitals, “but with infection rates rising rapidly, these assumptions are about to be tested,” says Nick Hood, business risk adviser at Opus Restructuring. “The other factor will be the arrival of winter, when there will inevitably be more close contact between people in the confined spaces of homes, public transport and offices, and when other illnesses leave some demographic groups physically weaker. Other coronavirus strains are highly seasonal – we do not yet know if Covid-19 will be too,” Hood says. The potential challenges a second wave will present to the health and care sector can be predicted based on initial experiences of the pandemic. Health and care leaders suggest we will be better equipped to deal with a second wave because of the lessons learned during the first outbreak.
Experience of tackling tough times Niall Dickson, chief executive of the NHS Confederation says: “The challenges ahead are clear. Last time around when the virus hit hard, there was frantic activity in parts of the service and an eery calm in others. It will not be like that this time.” Looking at what lies ahead, Dickson says: “We are in a much better place than we were when we first had to deal with a coming pandemic. “We know how to provide Covid-19 secure services for non-Covid-19 patients. There have been major advances in treatment for Covid-19 patients. There are better and more secure supplies of PPE. We have better, but still inadequate, testing. Local relationships are more developed, and we have the experience of tackling tough times,” he says.
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