To the residents of Blaenau Gwent,
Who would have thought that I would be writing to you at the start of a brand new year with heightened concerns over the situation with COVID-19. Sadly, this is the case and I am continuing to ask for your help in driving down the number of cases in order to keep our vulnerable people safe and stop our beloved NHS from becoming overwhelmed. More patients are now in hospital with COVID complications than at any point since this all began, and our frontline health staff are facing some real challenging and distressing times right now. We must do all that we can to help them.
It is now more important than ever that we all continue to stick to the rules. Wales is in lockdown! I think it is often easy to forget that, but we are under similar restrictions to when the Pandemic first started to take hold.
Under Alert Level 4 restrictions, you must:
• Stay at Home, except for very limited reasons
• Meet only the people you live with
• Work from home if you can
• Wear a face cover where required
• stay 2 metres from anyone you do not live with
• Self-isolate if you or anyone in your household has any symptoms.
Although a second wave of the virus was expected to emerge in the Autumn/Winter, I do not think it was predicted to hit this badly, and the added complication of a far more easily transmissible new strain has made this an even more difficult time.
Of course, we do have a light at the end of the tunnel in the form of the vaccines now approved and being administered to priority groups across the UK right now. Although lockdowns are extremely difficult for a number of reasons, the vaccines programmes do provide that hope that we can hopefully look forward to our lives returning to some kind of normal this year.
In Blaenau Gwent we are delighted to be working with our health colleagues on the rollout of the vaccine, and the borough’s first vaccination centre came on board in Ebbw Vale this week. By the end of this week staff and residents at approximately half of the care homes in Gwent will have received the vaccination – this is fantastic news for some of our most vulnerable people, their families and the people caring for them.
The Welsh Government has a Vaccination Strategy in place, setting out plans for how the vaccine will be delivered across Wales, and will also be publishing regular updates and data. Find out more about this here - https://gov.wales/covid-19-vaccination-strategy
Vaccines teach your immune system how to protect you from diseases. It's much safer for your immune system to learn this through vaccination than by catching the diseases and attempting to treat them. Vaccines can reduce or even eradicate some diseases, if enough people are vaccinated. Since vaccines were introduced, diseases like smallpox and polio that used to kill or disable millions of people are gone from the UK.
The long term response to the pandemic requires a safe and effective vaccine to be available for all who need it. It’s a way to keep friends and family safe, potentially leading to the lifting of restrictions, and I will be delighted to receive the vaccine when it’s my turn.
Public Health Wales has some very useful information on its website in relation to vaccines, you can find that here – https://phw.nhs.wales/topics/immunisation-and-vaccines/covid-19-vaccination-information/
Schools in Blaenau Gwent are currently providing remote learning for pupils until at least the 29th January, when this will be reviewed by the Welsh Government. The Minister has already indicated, however, that this will be extended unless case numbers in Wales fall significantly enough to allow a return to face-to-face teaching. Whilst school sites are closed, teaching and learning continues across the borough. Our schools are providing effective home learning, building on the experience of previous closures and feedback from families.
As per the Welsh Government directive, we are supporting the children of critical workers and our most vulnerable pupils who need to be in school, by accommodating them on site. Thanks to our dedicated education staff for your work.
Our local Test Trace Protect Service continues to work hard to reach out to positive cases and their contacts, and is currently reaching over 95% of cases in Blaenau Gwent within 24 hours. This is fantastic, but we are finding that a very small number of people are not able to be contacted. I would like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that it is very important to engage with the TTP Service for a number of reasons including preventing transmission of the virus; advice on self-isolation for you and your contacts and accessing help and support. This includes financial support where appropriate.
It’s coming up to 10 months of the Council, together with many public service colleagues, providing an emergency response. A great many of our staff will have been involved in this response in so many ways, both on the frontline and support behind the scenes, and I would like to thank everyone for their hard work and commitment.
To conclude, remember to look out for each other. As always, if you are struggling and have no support, or you are concerned about someone living in your community, do not hesitate to get in touch with us on 01495 311556.
Please let’s continue to work together to Keep Wales Safe.
Thank you.
Councillor Nigel Daniels
Leader ¹û¶³´«Ã½app
• The NHS COVID-19 app is used alongside traditional contact tracing to notify users if they come into contact with someone who later tests positive for coronavirus. You can download the NHS COVID-19 app from the App Store or Google Play Store. For more information on the NHS COVID-19 app visit www.covid19.nhs.uk
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• The latest advice & guidance can be found here:
https://phw.nhs.wales/
https://gov.wales/
https://www.gov.uk/