Hospital Visit Ban: Situation 'Regularly Reviewed'

The ban on hospital visits remains in place, but the Health Minister says all involved and working to lift it as soon as it's safe to do so.

The States voted yesterday (20 January) to allow people who don't have Covid-19 to visit - and for a robust system to be put in place to stop people with the virus from getting in.

Visits to adult wards and mental health wards were stopped last week after a few visitors came in with Covid symptoms and infected patients.

28 hospital patients have coronavirus.

The government said the visit ban was aimed at supporting the continued effective running of the hospital at a time when Covid-19 transmission remained high.

Deputy Richard Renouf says he's working with officers to look at options for introducing a robust system to allow visits.

"The situation is being regularly reviewed and all involved are working to resume normal visiting as soon as it is safe to do so.

The key consideration continues to be keeping the environment safe within the Hospital where work is ongoing to manage the effects of transmission of Covid into the inpatient bed base. Health and Community Services must continue to do all they can to protect Hospital patients. 

It is understood that is difficult for loved ones not to be able to visit a patient in Hospital.

Exceptions for this are in place for people receiving end-of-life care, for Maternity and SCBU, and other exceptional circumstances. Anyone who feels they have exceptional circumstances can call the relevant ward and speak to the ward manager.

Adult patients attending the Emergency Department still need to come in alone, and children can have one adult with them.

Anyone coming to the Hospital for an Outpatient appointment or to pick up a prescription from the Hospital Pharmacy is asked not to visit if they have any Covid symptoms."

A Jersey woman has told Channel 103 that her dad is struggling to cope with not being able to see any members of his family.

Deputy Jess Perchard has called the rule that only one adult can accompany a child to A&E 'ill-considered'.

"I think that if you have a child and you have to rush to hospital with that child and you are a parent, it shouldn't matter if you're a mother or a father, it shouldn't make a difference to how we perceive how much someone is affected.

The parent of a child who has to go into hospital is emotionally affected and we can't pit one parent against another in this emotional way.

If my husband and I took our child to A&E and I was told 'well he can stay but you have to leave', I just wouldn't leave!

Of course, there are different circumstances, different reasons for why a child would go to A&E, but to have this blanket rule, it doesn't make sense to me as a parent and just as an empathetic person."

In response, Deputy Renouf says the rationale for only allowing one parent in with a child is to prevent crowding in a clinical area.

"If you think about it, it's the same reason why, at the height of the pandemic, we introduced social distancing in places like supermarkets because we needed to prevent crowding in areas where infection can spread and especially in a clinical area.

But we have allowed in more than one parent or additional relatives in exceptional circumstances."