Recommendation 9

The pandemic placed great stress on some health and social care workers already under pressure. In our report Readying the NHS and social care for the COVID-19 peak, we found that thanks to the commitment of thousands of staff and volunteers and by postponing a large amount of planned work, the NHS was severely stretched but able to meet overall demand for COVID-19 treatment during the pandemic’s April 2020 peak. We warned that staff in the health and social care sector could not be expected to be ready to cope with future peaks and also deal with the enormous backlogs that had built up. In May 2020, about 45% of doctors responding to a survey by the British Medical Association reported suffering from depression, anxiety, stress, burnout, emotional distress or other mental health conditions relating to or made worse by their work.18 We received written evidence from Dr James Gilleen, University of Roehampton, who carried out a study on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on NHS healthcare workers. The study, based on a survey with 2,775 respondents, found that the number of workers with the most 13 Qq 1, 3, 46; Letter from the Department of Health & Social Care, 22 June 2021 14 Q 1; Letter from the Department of Health & Social Care, 9 June 2021 15 Committee of Public Accounts, The adult social care workforce in England, HC 690, Session 2017–19, 9 May 2018, paras 4, 7, 20 16 C&AG’s Report, NHS financial management and sustainability, Session 2019–20, HC 44, 5 February 2020, paras 8, 19 and Figure 3 17 British Medical Association (Ev ILG004); NHS Vacancy Statistics, England, April 2015 - December 2020 18 Qq 80–82; C&AG’s Report, para 39; Committee of Public Accounts, Readying the NHS and social care for the COVID-19 peak, Fourteenth Report of Session 2019–21, HC 405, 29 July 2020 12 Initial lessons from the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic severe levels of stress, anxiety and depression quadrupled in April 2020 compared to pre- COVID-19 levels. This was