Covid-19 Information for Patients

Stay at Home – Protect the NHS – Save Lives

Rules for Everyone

From Monday 1 June:

  • You can spend time outdoors, including private gardens and other outdoor spaces, in groups of up to six people from different households, following social distancing guidelines
  • You should go to work if you cannot work from home and your business has not been required to close by law
  • More shops are beginning to reopen, with a plan for more to do so later in the month
  • Children in early years (age 0-5), reception, year 1 and year 6 can return to childcare or school in line with the arrangements made by their school
  • You can be tested as part of the test and trace programme, which will enable us to return to normal life as soon as possible, by helping to control transmission risks

This plan is dependent on us continuing to successfully control the spread of the virus. If the evidence does not show sufficient progress is being made in controlling the virus to justify the easements, then the proposed lifting of restrictions may have to be delayed until such a time as it is safe to do so. If, after lifting restrictions, the government sees a concerning rise in the infection rate, then it may have to re-impose some restrictions in as targeted a way as possible.

That is why you should stay alert and follow social distancing guidelines.

You must not:

  • gather in groups of more than six people with people you do not live with
  • visit friends or family inside their home or any other indoor place
  • stay away from your own home overnight, except for in a limited set of circumstances, such as for work purposes
  •  

You can read the latest guidance here on the NHS website.

You can read the government guidance here.

St Helens CCG has teamed up with the council and other partners in St Helens Cares to support the Street Champions volunteer scheme run by St Helens Voluntary and Community Action (VCA) and needs volunteers to help by delivering supplies or medication, making a friendly phone call to someone self-isolating and sharing key messages across your community. Register your detailshere or call 01744 457100

People at high risk (clinically extremely vulnerable)

People at high risk from coronavirus include people who:

  • have had an organ transplant
  • are having chemotherapy or antibody treatment for cancer, including immunotherapy
  • are having an intense course of radiotherapy (radical radiotherapy) for lung cancer
  • are having targeted cancer treatments that can affect the immune system (such as protein kinase inhibitors or PARP inhibitors)
  • have blood or bone marrow cancer (such as leukaemia, lymphoma or myeloma)
  • have had a bone marrow or stem cell transplant in the past 6 months, or are still taking immunosuppressant medicine
  • have been told by a doctor they have a severe lung condition (such as cystic fibrosis, severe asthma or severe COPD)
  • have a condition that means they have a very high risk of getting infections (such as SCID or sickle cell)
  • are taking medicine that makes them much more likely to get infections (such as high doses of steroids or immunosuppressant medicine)
  • have a serious heart condition and are pregnant

If you’re at high risk from coronavirus, you should have received a letter from the NHS.

Speak to your GP or hospital care team if you have not been contacted and think you should have been.

You can find further advice on what to do if you are at high risk here.

Extremely vulnerable people should ask friends, family or neighbours to pick up shopping and medicines for them and leave them outside their door. People can also ask for help from volunteers by calling Liverpool City Council on 0151 233 3066 from 8am to 6pm, seven days a week or request online help here.

People with certain health conditions

Some VCSEs have worked with the NHS to produce specific advice about coronavirus for certain conditions, which can be found here.

What to do if you have symptoms of coronavirus

Most people with coronavirus have at least one of the following symptoms.

  • high temperature – this means you feel hot to touch on your chest or back (you do not need to measure your temperature)
  • new, continuous cough – this means coughing a lot for more than an hour, or 3 or more coughing episodes in 24 hours (if you usually have a cough, it may be worse than usual)
  • loss or change to your sense of smell or taste – this means you’ve noticed you cannot smell or taste anything, or things smell or taste different to normal

Getting Medical Help

If you need medical help, do not go to places like a GP surgery, pharmacy or hospital in person.

For health information and advice, please use these internet and phone options:-

• The NHS website to check symptoms and for health advice

• Your GP surgery website ( use this link to find it ) and use their online support where possible.

• For same-day medical help, use the NHS 111 online service. Call 111 if you’re unable to get help online. For BSL use this video interpreter service for NHS111.

• For life-threatening emergencies, call 999 for an ambulance. If you use BSL or can’t speak on the phone you can register for 999 texts, send the word ‘register’ in an SMS message to 999 and follow instructions.

Anyone with a medical appointment should check the website of where they were going before attending, or phone. Visiting in hospitals is highly restricted now to very certain cases, again please check websites for latest.

I hope this is helpful. There is a lot of incorrect information circulating, so if you can, please help share these official sources of information with your friends, family and colleagues.

Other Languages

Doctors of the World and the British Red Cross have translated NHS guidance into 60 languages which you can download here.

Other Info

LCVS have set up this web page to share information for the VCSE sector including funding options and other support/advice available.

You can also find out more local news, information and updates from your local Clinical Commissioning Group, which are responsible for planning NHS services across local boroughs, and work with other clinicians and healthcare providers to ensure they meet the needs of local people.

Liverpool Clinical Commissioning Group

South Sefton Clinical Commissioning Group

Halton Clinical Commissioning Group

Knowsley Clinical Commissioning Group

St Helens Clinical Commissioning Group