Most people in Milton Keynes will eventually get coronavirus, but you shouldn't panic, says the council's leader.
Cllr Pete Marland heads up MK Council, which includes adult social care and public health officials, and he gave a meeting on Tuesday (March 10) an update on how the battle against covid 19 is progressing.
Cllr Alice Jenkins (Cons, Danesborough & Walton) asked Cllr Marland (Lab, Wolverton) to give reassurances about the council’s contingency plans for dealing with the spread of the covid 19 virus.
Cllr Marland said: “Whilst there is slight apprehension about covid 19, the overall risk to the general population remains very low.”
He said the main reason for a lot of the actions being put into place were to make the disease “endemic, rather than pandemic.”
He said: “It’s highly likely that most of us will at some point get covid 19.
“However, if we all got it at the same time our social care and hospital system would be overwhelmed.
“Therefore what we are doing in the containment phase is not to stop infection completely, it is to slow the rate of infection down, so our services don’t become overwhelmed.”
Cllr Marland also repeated his appeal for the people of Milton Keynes “not to panic, not to bulk buy”.
The council aims to “continue to make sure that services run as best they can,” he added. “But it is a fast-developing situation.”
Cllr Marland told the meeting of the cabinet that both he and deputy leader, Cllr Hannah O’Neill (Lab, Woughton& Fishermead) were being “continually briefed” on the covid 19 situation.
“As you would imagine it’s quite quickly moving,” he said. Various plans have been kicked into gear, and the council is working with its partners, including the hospital.
He revealed that following the death of a member of the public at MK hospital, the council’s social care team moved 40 vulnerable people out of hospital.
“That was over the weekend and all our staff should be congratulated for the amount of time and effort they put in.”
Cllr O’Neill, who is the council’s elected head of health and wellbeing, said the council’s public health officials have been involved in tracing the contacts of people who have contracted the virus.
The council’s director of public health, Muriel Scott, is also having “regular updates” on the situation every day with Public Health England.
