What I learned from a lovely woman on a packed ward in hospital | Zoe Williams

Healthy people are being forced to stay in hospital because of a lack of social care – and it’s an indictment of our current systemPoliticians talk constantly about the crisis in social care, and the pressure it puts on the NHS, so that the words just turn into a hum. Then you brush against that in real life and think why is anyone, with any kind of authority over anything, doing any activity that isn’t sorting out social care?My mum has been in hospital, on a ward with five other patients, most of whom are vocally very displeased with being there. My mum just wants to feel less crappy, and fair play, who wouldn’t? The woman diagonally opposite just wants to see a doctor, but is a bit fogged on when she last saw one, which is hard. The woman directly opposite has a massive family, and gets constant Fomo, even when they’re all – even the teenagers – right round her bed, and she’s the event she would otherwise be missing out on. The woman in the corner was incredibly buoyed by the appearance of an emotional support dog, but then it had to move on to its other rounds, and after that she started full-time missing her own dog. Continue reading...