When the news leaked at the weekend that the government was considering telling those aged 70 and over to self-quarantine for 12 weeks to protect them from catching coronavirus, I began to worry about my elderly neighbours. How will they get essential supplies, particularly if the supermarkets’ home delivery services get backed up? What if they’re not on Netflix and have gone through all their box sets? Who will walk their dogs? It was time to summon up that famous Dunkirk spirit and create a network of volunteers willing to muck in until the crisis is over.
A bit of googling revealed I was far from alone in thinking this. Turns out, neighbourhood groups across the country have set up WhatsApp groups to look after vulnerable people during the epidemic. But when I suggested this to the chair of my local residents’ association — Richard, 68 — he demurred. Many of the over-70s won’t know how to use WhatsApp, he explained, and some of them won’t have mobiles or internet access.
She fits in the palm of my hand, and her bark at top volume sounds like a very angry mouse
Better, he decided, to put a simpler system in place. So he emailed all the people in the association and asked anyone willing to help to reply with their name, address and phone number. Once he’d accumulated a list of volunteers, he then sent out a second email that included the volunteers’ contact details and advised anyone who needs assistance to call the person on the list who lives nearest to them. That makes sense, not least because many of the volunteers will already know their elderly neighbours.
When I told Rosemary, my fit-as-a-fiddle septuagenarian mother-in-law, about this arrangement she was less impressed than I’d hoped.
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