Friday 29 May 2020
The first report of findings from the Community Monitoring Tool has been published.
The online tool was launched at the end of March to give Islanders another channel through which they could request support or information during the "lockdown". It was intended to help with the identification and prioritisation of the needs of the community that were not being met by the support and information already being provided. It is also providing data in the form of a longitudinal study, which is being used to inform coronavirus related services and strategies.
Colin Vaudin, Chief Information Officer for the States of Guernsey said:
"I'm pleased to be able to share this first report of findings, which I hope readers will find informative and useful. The Community Monitoring Tool was rapidly built in March as it was recognised that there would be gaps in the support and information we were providing to the community. We needed a way to identify those gaps, so they could be addressed. It was designed to help us to gauge the wellbeing of the whole population during lockdown, not just those that were ill or in contact with one of our support services. It also gave members of the community the ability to make requests, express concerns and share their thoughts.
The response has been and continues to be absolutely fantastic and I'd like to thank all the participants for their contributions, which have been really valuable. New participants are welcome to sign up online at any time."
Helen Walton, Head of Data & Analysis added:
"This report summarises all the information gathered to date, including analysis of the topics of support and information requested and the prevalence of coronavirus-like symptoms in the community, which have decreased to very low levels. The data gathered was used "live" to help inform the structure of the covid19.gov.gg website when it was built and the topics to be covered in media briefings, as well as to inform the lockdown exit strategy.
We will start to ask participants about different topical subjects next week and another report will follow in a few weeks' time, covering those new areas. I'd like to echo Mr Vaudin's thanks to everyone that has shared their experiences via this channel - I appreciate that in some cases it has been difficult to even put them into words, but that doesn't make them any less important. As with all of our publications, we have done our best to reflect the range of experiences in a balanced and objective way."
See https://covid19.gov.gg/together/monitoring for further details.
