London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Sunday, Oct 12, 2025

Care home visits to resume in England

Care home residents in England can begin to be reunited with one of their loved ones, the government has said, as it publishes new guidance.

Visits will resume in care homes once local authorities and local public health directors say it is safe.

Residents will be limited to seeing the same one visitor, where possible, the guidance says.

Some providers began allowing outdoor, socially-distanced visits in June, in the absence of government guidelines.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock said it was now possible to "carefully and safely" allow visits to care homes, while taking into account "local knowledge and circumstances for each care home".

People in registered residential care and those in nursing homes for people with learning disabilities, mental health or other disabilities in England will also be able to welcome visitors under the same guidance.

The government said visits could resume after the rate of community transmission of coronavirus had fallen, but staff, residents and visitors should observe its guidance to minimise the risk of spreading the virus.

It says care providers should consider whether visits could take place outside, without people having to go through a shared building, and visitors should stick to social distancing guidance and avoid hugs or handshakes.

Ad hoc visits should be discouraged and providers should collect contact details of visitors to support NHS Test and Trace, the guidance says.

Visitors should also be encouraged to wear a face covering and risk assessments must be carried out before homes reopen.

Gifts for residents should be easy to clean by care home staff. "It is unlikely that they will be able to bring flowers but a box of chocolates that could be sanitised with wipes would be allowed," the guidance says.

Care England, the country's largest representative body for independent providers of adult social care, said it was "disappointed" the guidance had come so late.

Chief executive Professor Martin Green said: "This guidance should have been with care providers last month.

"We are at a loss to understand why the Department of Health and Social Care cannot act quickly in a crisis or why it is deaf to the comments and input from the sector."

It comes as the UK recorded the deaths of another 79 people who tested positive for coronavirus, taking the total number of deaths to 45,501.


'Mum needs reassurance and affection'

Lesley Lightfoot says not being able to be with her mum Blumah, who has Parkinson's dementia, during lockdown has been "the most painful thing I've ever been through".

For months, she stood outside her mum's north London care home, talking to her through a ground floor window. In recent weeks, the home has allowed some outdoor visits.

But Ms Lightfoot wants clarity on whether the latest guidelines mean she'll be able to see her mum indoors.

"To be able to see her outside doesn't solve my problem. I need to get in and be with her in her room," she says, adding that her mum's mental state has deteriorated with the isolation of lockdown. "She needs the reassurance, the love, the affection, the looking at things with her, the going through things with her."

The government said it will be down to individual care homes, working with public health officials, to decide whether visits can take place inside people's rooms.

In Scotland, visits to virus-free homes resumed earlier this month. In Wales, outdoor visits are allowed and in Northern Ireland, one person can visit a resident, with a second person accommodated "where possible".

Sue Parker from Ovingham, Northumberland, who has a 29-year-old son with autism and OCD, welcomed the guidance but said it would not help in her case as it isn't an option to visit her son in his residential care home.

She explained he would not tolerate relatives visiting his care home and would only accept leaving to his family home - something he did most weekends before the pandemic.

"It seems throughout that it has been a blanket one-size-fits-all policy [for social care], with a focus on the elderly and frail," she said, adding that the new guidance seemed to be "disproportionate" for her son, given that he is young and physically fit.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
California County Reinstates Mask Mandate in Health Facilities as Respiratory Illness Risk Rises
Israel and Hamas Agree to First Phase of Trump-Brokered Gaza Truce, Hostages to Be Freed
French Political Turmoil Elevates Marine Le Pen as Rassemblement National Poised for Power
China Unveils Sweeping Rare Earth Export Controls to Shield ‘National Security’
The Davos Set in Decline: Why the World Economic Forum’s Power Must Be Challenged
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
A Dollar Coin Featuring Trump’s Portrait Expected to Be Issued Next Year
Australia Orders X to Block Murder Videos, Citing Online Safety and Public Exposure
Three Scientists Awarded Nobel Prize in Medicine for Discovery of Immune Self-Tolerance Mechanism
OpenAI and AMD Forge Landmark AI-Chip Alliance with Equity Option
Munich Airport Reopens After Second Drone Shutdown
France Names New Government Amid Political Crisis
Trump Stands Firm in Shutdown Showdown and Declares War on Drug Cartels — Turning Crisis into Opportunity
Surge of U.S. Billionaires Transforms London’s Peninsula Apartments into Ultra-Luxury Stronghold
Pro Europe and Anti-War Babiš Poised to Return to Power After Czech Parliamentary Vote
Jeff Bezos Calls AI Surge a ‘Good’ Bubble, Urges Focus on Lasting Innovation
Japan’s Ruling Party Chooses Sanae Takaichi, Clearing Path to First Female Prime Minister
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs Sentenced to Fifty Months in Prison Following Prostitution Conviction
Taylor Swift’s ‘Showgirl’ Launch Extends Billion-Dollar Empire
Trump Administration Launches “TrumpRx” Plan to Enable Direct Drug Sales at Deep Discounts
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
×