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Words matter, especially in times of crisis. This article analyses the complexities of political discourse on vulnerability by considering the case of the Dutch COVID-19 response. Our study finds that the framing of vulnerability as a predetermined and naturalised condition, linked to old age and pre-existing medical conditions, draws attention away from aspects of precarisation tied to economic position, social class, cultural background and living conditions. This rhetorical strategy can be understood as a practice of de-responsibilisation through which attention is rhetorically diverted from the way(s) in which political authorities are implicated in producing, exacerbating or failing to mitigate vulnerabilities.
Family carers of people with dementia have reported increased caring demands during the COVID-19 pandemic. The aim of this qualitative study is to explore seven family carers’ accounts of dementia caregiving one year into the COVID-19 pandemic in England in relation to carer resilience. Themes describe the complex challenges of caring during the pandemic, with interviewees burned out and ‘caring beyond capacity’ due to unmet needs within the caring role, therein highlighting the limitations of building individual resilience only. Timely practical support for carers is essential to protect their well-being and to ward against the potential consequences of carer burnout.
In response to COVID-19, many care homes closed to visitors and new ways for carers and residents to stay in touch were tried. This UK study employed an online survey to explore carer experiences of staying in touch from a distance. The research highlighted: the importance of ongoing connections (through visits and remotely); diverse approaches to maintaining contact; and concerns about safeguarding and well-being. Findings underscore the importance of developing personalised approaches to staying in touch during future care home closures and for those who require an ongoing approach to remote contact due to distance, illness or additional caring responsibilities.
This study investigates the lived experiences of multiple sclerosis family carers during the COVID-19 pandemic and explores the impact of the pandemic on psychological resilience processes using a socioecological framework. Following thematic analysis of interviews, two main findings emerged: first, behavioural vigilance intended to mitigate viral spread eclipsed carers’ needs and deprived them of support resources; and, second, multiple sclerosis carers harboured resilience via practices of gratitude and leveraging interpersonal relationships. Future action is needed to develop public crisis responses that integrate multiple sclerosis carers’ needs, including improved care-continuity models, the alleviation of social isolation and advancements in multifaceted wellness preservation.
Home care service providers have been considerably affected by the COVID-19 crisis. Since the beginning of the pandemic, their internal organisation has undergone important changes, including in terms of time schedules, to adapt to the needs of the older population and those of workers. In most cases, they had to reduce the provision of services, either because care workers – the majority of whom are women – were no longer available to cover the shifts, or because families had cancelled the services. In other cases, they had to meet increased demand. The most dramatic consequences were borne by female care workers, who had to combine working time adjustments with family obligations. Drawing from the material collected before and after the impact of the pandemic in Belgium, which includes interviews with public and private home care providers, this article explores the consequences that time adjustments had on frontline care workers and on the organisations themselves.
The COVID-19 pandemic poses specific risks to vulnerable population groups. Informal carers for older adults are especially at risk of increased strain, as support from social networks and professional care services is no longer available or in short supply. Already before the pandemic, caring was unequally distributed within societies, with women and people in lower socio-economic status groups bearing a higher risk of caring strain. In this article, we propose a conceptual framework of (unequal) caring strain during the pandemic. We then summarise the state of empirical research, suggest questions for future studies and outline implications for social policy.
This article explores findings from a qualitative participatory study with asylum seekers in Ireland employed in the healthcare sector during the COVID-19 pandemic. By extending an intersectional analysis framework, we demonstrate how the vulnerability of care workers living within the international protection accommodation system ‘under the care’ of the state intersects with power exercised by the neoliberal care market and is compounded by global health controls instituted during the pandemic. Participants reveal a lack of autonomy and forms of precarity that were not faced by other care workers, particularly increased risk of exposure to COVID-19 and multiple forms of stigma.
COVID-19 has meant that, globally, people, organisations and governments have had to make huge changes in life and work. The aim of this study is to explore the impact of working during the first wave of COVID-19 on Admiral Nurse practice (specialists in dementia care who support families affected by dementia). Semi-structured interviews were used to gather data from 19 Admiral Nurses. Themes drawn from the data show that Admiral Nurses experienced an immediate sense of impotence and helplessness, and, from there, moved through a process of adaptation to reach a new level of competence. This research provides insight into the experiences of Admiral Nurses and their adaptability in extraordinary circumstances.
The initial outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic hit Wuhan, China, in early January 2020, and restrictive lockdown measures were implemented. Risks of transmission and the lockdown measures severely disrupted everyday life and affected the well-being of local residents. Applying institutional ethnography and autoethnography, this study focuses on the virtual mutual care of Chinese social network site users, which attended to the hardship of local people through activities in cyberspace. Not only were the virtual mutual care activities lifesaving, as they tackled critical challenges of the affected residents, but they also had radical meanings, as they strived for solidarity and justice in the context of crisis.
The conceptualisation of a caring democracy provides strong arguments against neoliberal welfare states. However, there is currently a knowledge gap regarding how non-market-oriented welfare states are striving to reach their intention of a caring democracy. Based on a qualitative study, this article uses the case of Norwegian long-term care services for older people to provide insight into how this intention is practised in everyday care service settings when the current development is about active citizenship. The findings show ethical dilemmas for care managers and healthcare professionals, positioned on the front line of combining the creation of active citizens with the democratisation of services.
