An update on our Covid measures

Happy New Year to all from Healthy Minds. 

We’re entering 2022 with new programmes across many of our services and some new developments that will increase emotional health and wellbeing support for more people in Calderdale. 

There is understandably a lot of concern about the continued impact of Covid and the Omicron variant. I want to set out how Healthy Minds is dealing with this so that everyone can make choices with the right information. 

We plan to continue to offer a mixture of online, telephone and in-person activities. If you are already on contact lists for groups and activities, workers will ensure that you are kept informed and details of all activities can be found on our website. 

In-person / face-to-face activities will carry on where possible. We will do everything we can to ensure everyone’s safety: all activities have a current risk assessment that considers the space available, suitable ventilation, numbers attending and suitable precautions like distancing and sanitisation. We will keep registers of who has attended group activities. Staff will be taking lateral flow tests (LFT) prior to activities.  
Please help us to keep activities safe for everyone. If you are attending any in-person group activities: 

• Take a lateral flow test beforehand – if your test is positive, please do not attend the group and notify the group organiser; 
• If you feel ill, or have any symptoms associated with Covid, please do not attend the group even if you have a negative LFT result.  
• For indoor settings, you may be asked to wear a face-covering / mask – please do, if you can. 
• Please respect and follow any other measures as instructed by the group facilitator.

Healthy Minds strongly encourages vaccination. The precautions we are taking aim to protect everyone, vaccinated or not. 

Covid infections, particularly with the Omicron variant, are rising in the population and we already have higher than usual staff absence.  It is likely that some activities will be affected and plans may have to change at short notice. We will make our best efforts to notify people if this happens. If some regular activities like support groups have to be paused, we will do our best to offer you alternative groups or activities in the meantime so that you still have support. 

By working together and everyone doing their bit to look after ourselves and others, we hope that we can carry on with everything as planned, safely and responsibly. 

- Jonny Richardson-Glenn, Chief Officer