How Do We Heal? from Covid19

As the significant recent pressures of Covid-19 begin to subside and our Covid-19 vaccination programme continues, we are thinking about how we will move forward again into the future as a health and care system. We know that this will involve detailed recovery planning for our NHS and social care services, for local government and wider public services and for our voluntary and community sector organisations. We also know that in every sector we take forward with us significant learning from the pandemic and changes to the way we work as individuals, organisations and systems.

Covid-19 has affected each of the one million people living in Suffolk and North East Essex in very different ways. So for us all to move forward we need more than just a plan – we need to think about how each of us feel and how we can build on our experiences of the past year.

In recent months we have started to think about ‘How do we heal?’ and to ask everyone in Suffolk and North East Essex to explore how we can heal:

• Ourselves and our families?
• Our communities?
• Our NHS services?
• Our social care sector?
• Our Voluntary, Community and Social Enterprise sector?
• Our health and care workforce?

And recognising the many inequalities in our communities: How do we help EVERYONE to heal?

We have been listening in a range of ways. We have helped to organise listening events, Community Conversations where people, organisations and networks have come together to reflect on the last year, and to think about ‘How do we Heal?’ We have held an Equalities Film Competition inviting local people and groups to make short films to share their experiences and their perspectives on the topic of ‘How do we Heal?’ in creative ways. And we have held two events, an online event to consider ‘How do we Heal? Our Workforce’ on 2 June 2021, and a Summit event on 16 June 2021 with a broad range of speakers and announcing the winners of our Equalities Film Competition.