Hello…It’s Been A While But We Are #StillSick

In this edition…

An update of what we have been up to and plans for the upcoming International Long Covid Day

Sorry for the lack of recent updates: We promise that our work continues in the background!

Rachel is off to London next week on a Long Covid, top secret visit - more will be revealed soon! Keep an eye on our Twitter account for more information at the time! As she puts it - she seems to have a habit of coordinating her trips to coincide with Budget Day! She has also been dealing with work-related issues, as well as discussing what their future looks like. Rachel continues to appear in local and English media from time to time, including last week, due to ITV’s Breathtaking.

Sarah is enjoying some much-deserved R&R (where’s our postcards?!) in between dealing with a lot of things going on at home.

Brenda has been busy in the Scottish media. We are hoping she is called to be a witness at the Scottish Covid Inquiry.

Cass? Well Cass never knows when to stop: They recently completed their witness statement sessions for the Scottish Covid Inquiry and continue to work with the Scottish Healthcare Workers’ Coalition ahead of its appearance at the Inquiry. Cass is also still working on the Pensions Report (despite the above, health issues and an awful experience at a DWP medical assessment) and says it’s starting to look less like data and more like a report! Unfortunately, Cass also lost their beloved Ragdoll cat, Mia, just shy of the 11th anniversary of collecting her. As Cass doesn’t have a partner or children, they had a very close bond with her. They’re doing as well as can be expected with the companionship of their other erstwhile cat, Archie. Cass is planning on attending the Scottish Parliament on 13th March, for their ICLD event and possibly the debate as well. We know Long Covid Scotland are hoping this will be a major event and trigger a political and media conversation about Long Covid healthcare and other support in Scotland. Cass also wrote a blog post for Lib Dem Voice about Breathtaking and being a former keyworker with Long Covid. Does Cass often feel the effects of all this? Yes. Frequently! (Do we think they’ll change? Nope. Not until there’s a better deal for the Long Covid U.K. community). Cass always promises us all they’ll take it a bit easier (then doesn’t).

The rest of our team are dealing with ongoing health and personal issues, as well as their families. They are all doing well!

If you’ve not been following the various U.K. Long Covid social media accounts, such as for Long Covid Support, Long Covid Advocacy, Long Covid Scotland, Long Covid SOS, Long Covid Kids and so on, it’s worth keeping an eye out: There are likely to be public awareness campaigns about Long Covid, particularly in the light of Breathtaking on ITV last week.

If you want to join in and raise awareness, we would ask you to make a sign, either typed or handwritten, using the hashtags in our photo above - #StillSick #LongCovid and under it, add the date you first became unwell (eg Since 3/4/2020). Then, if you are one, add your profession or #Keyworker and your location (if you want to).

Then we’d like you to take a photo, with the sign showing - this could either be a selfie or a photo of the sign with something that really signifies your Long Covid journey, for example your medications or mobility aid.

During the week 11-15 March (but especially on the 15th - which is ILCD), post (and repost, share, and so on) your photos across all your social media using the following hashtags in your post:

Add the date you first became unwell with Covid, your (former) Keyworker profession and location, if applicable, or start your post with “I support those who are…” and don’t forget to tag us in on @keyworkerpetuk!

We also recommend you tag in the other Long Covid charities and organisations as well! Let’s get this trending!

That’s all from us just now - we will (try to) post out a reminder in the next couple of weeks to remind you and we look forwards to sharing some of your posts and, if the winds are in our favour, Cass will have the Pensions Report finished ahead of the event at the Scottish Parliament for Long Covid on March 13th!

PS - Cass says if anyone fancies helping with the dataset from excel for the good pension survey responses and knows how to make shiny pie charts and tables, can they drop us an email on KeyworkerpetitionUK@gmail.com

PPS - We are going to have a conversation soon about merchandise for sale! Rachel came up with her own design for a hoodie that we think is amazing and we know people were asking about our T-shirts from last year. This is all pending on our getting a bank account set up so that we can then sort out an account with one of the online providers (to save us issues relating to printing, postage and sales). It’s often expensive for us to be able to travel for advocacy related work, hotel costs and so on, so being able to raise funds would be a good thing! So far, we are thinking about stickers, mugs, possibly T-shirts and hoodies on a print-on-demand basis. We will keep you posted!