'A virus is
nothing': elderly WW2 survivors refuse to submit to panic
Over-70s asked to self-isolate compare coronavirus
crisis to wartime childhood memories
Maureen
Childs, 80, at her balcony, on the seventh floor of a tower block near Tower
Bridge. Photograph: Jill Mead/The Guardian
Maureen
Childs, 80, isn’t scared of coronavirus. She is careful not to catch the bug as
she self-isolates in her seventh-floor flat in east London, but like many of
the millions of elderly people now being told to severely limit their
activities, she has lived through a far greater catastrophe: the second world
war.
“I can remember the
sounds of the doodlebugs going over,” she said as she contemplated her second
week in almost complete lockdown, one of 7.8 million people in the UK aged 70
or older who, regardless of medical conditions, are being told by the
government to self-isolate.
German motorised
bombs flew over London as she and her family listened to the radio and “as soon
as the sound stopped we were all sitting there petrified because you didn’t
know if you were underneath it.” One day, they were and the device blew out the
doors and the windows of her home. “A virus is nothing compared to that,” she
said.
Comparisons between
the current public health crisis and wartime are much-discussed among the
generation most vulnerable to Covid-19. But as Public Health England instructs
them to avoid non-essential use of public transport, avoid gatherings in public
or with friends and family and only use telephones or go online to contact GPs,
different problems are emerging.
“It’s the lack of
exercise that worries me,” she said. “When I did go out [to the shop and to the
bank], the walking got to me. I lost the use of my legs. I need to be more
disciplined and do exercise at home, but I feel such a ninny.”
Childs thinks she
is part of a rump of the elderly who she fears are being overlooked – millions
of over-70s who would normally fend for themselves, but who are made vulnerable
by the latest isolation orders. They are not necessarily among the 1.2 million
of the most vulnerable who the NHS is now instructing to stay at home at all
times and avoid any face-to-face contact for a period of at least 12 weeks.
“The frail are well looked after,” said
Childs, who had an active life as a national organiser for the Green party and
committee member for the British Computer Society. “It’s the ones who aren’t
very frail who have fallen through the cracks because we are left to look after
ourselves, which we’re proud to be able to do. But we don’t get much advice or
help.”
Paul Goulden,
director of The Silver Line, a helpline for the elderly that has been inundated
with callers concerned about coronavirus, urges “everyone to pick up the phone
and check on your older family, friends and neighbours and see how you can
help”.
Patricia Shooter,
84, hunkering down with her husband, Bill, 94, at their home in Leicester, has
also been comparing the coronavirus crisis to her wartime childhood in
Sheffield.
“I do feel scared,
but I was also scared when the bombers were going over,” she said. “Our house
was bombed. The planes came down over the moor. I remember being in the garden
[where they were sheltering] and wondering, ‘Where’s the house?’ I don’t want
to be ill and I don’t want to die. But I don’t want to start panicking about
coronavirus.”
Shooter was also
active and used to swim five times a week. Last week she only swam once (she
felt safe as there were only five other people in the pool). She has been
shopping in Aldi, wearing gloves and wrapping a scarf over her mouth.
“I have always been
independent and I am not being silly,” she said. “I am cleaning every day with
disinfectant wipes, cleaning all the doorhandles.”
Both Shooter and
Childs struggle with the idea of volunteers doing their shopping. “I like to
pick what I like to pick,” said Shooter. “They won’t like it,” said Childs. “Old
people are very proud. We are a grumpy old bunch, but we have reason to be
grumpy. People treat us like children.”
For now, the
elderly and their families are taking it one day at a time. The charity Age UK
is encouraging families to “connect and reassure older people in this uncertain
time” not just by phone, text and video calls, but by sending letters,
postcards and pictures from grandchildren too.
“Picking up
shopping, prescriptions or running errands could help to alleviate any worries
and concerns they may have about how they’re going to cope,” said Caroline
Abrahams, charity director at Age UK.
“Doing what we can
to encourage older people to stay physically active at home and ensuring they
remain connected and included will be essential. This could mean making sure
people have what they need to keep going with their hobbies and interests, like
wool if they are knitters.”
Childs has been
trying to reach out and help her friends by sending web links to online courses
that they might find diverting. Many are in computer programming, but there’s
also a six-week course on 19th-century opera, a four-week course on Sikhism,
three weeks on Beethoven’s ninth symphony, and an eight-week course on the
fundamentals of neuroscience.
However, at least
one of the courses might be postponed to a more appropriate time: a four-week
module entitled “Lessons from Ebola: preventing the next pandemic”.
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