Care home chief executive Dr Jane Douglas is doing what others in her position appear to believe is impossible.
Through properly planned infection control procedures, she is allowing the families of her residents at Queen’s House in Kelso proper visiting rights while remaining Covid-free.
Relatives can spend up to four hours each week with their loved ones, give them a hug and supply the sort of emotional support that should be a basic human right.
Queen’s House should be an example to the managers of homes across the country that this is not only possible, but essential.
It is disgraceful that thousands of our most elderly and vulnerable citizens across Scotland have now been in virtual isolation for eight months.
Thousands have died – many of them dementia sufferers who would have spent their last days confused – without their family by their side.
As things stand, the Scottish Government and others in the care industry are allowing a humanitarian crisis to continue.
They will be judged harshly in the public inquiries and investigations which will surely follow this pandemic.
Cutting people off from their loved ones in response to Covid-19 is the easy way out.
But as world leading infection control expert Claire Kilpatrick points out – it is not the right thing to do.
