Coronavirus: Adult social care key issues and sources

Section one of the briefing provides a high-level overview of policy in relation to adult social care since the start of the coronavirus outbreak in early 2020, including the development of key UK Government guidance.

The remaining sections provide more detailed information on some key issues that have arisen during the course of the pandemic, including:

• Statistics on deaths in care homes
• Funding for adult social care, including the financial pressures on social care providers
• Testing for care home staff and residents
• The discharging of patients from hospitals into care homes
• Rules relating to visiting care homes during the pandmic
• The supply of PPE to the adult social care sector
• The roll-out of the Covid-19 vaccine to the adult social care sector, including the policy of making vaccination compulsory for people working in care homes.

The Commons Library Briefing paper, Coronavirus: Local authorities’ adult social care duties (the Care Act easements), provides an overview of changes to local authority duties around the provision of adult social care during the coronavirus outbreak. The changes were brought into force on 31 March 2020, under the Coronavirus Act 2020. However, in its one-year review of the Coronavirus Act, the Government stated that it would bring forward regulations after the Easter recess to expire the provisions. Regulations to this effect were laid on 21 April 2021 and came into force on 16 July 2021.