Doncaster Council gets £4m for 'proactive Covid-19 containment and intervention' measures

Members of Mayor Ros Jones’s cabinet are expected to rubber-stamp proposals that outline future proactive containment and intervention measures.

Council bosses said the Covid-19 control funding from the government will help support measures to ‘mitigate and manage outbreaks of Covid-19’ and to build ‘resilience ahead of winter 2021/22’.

Some of the £4 million will go towards targeted testing for hard-to-reach groups out of scope of other testing programmes and additional contact tracing.

The council also plans to carry out ‘enhanced communication and marketing’ towards hard-to-reach groups and other localised messaging as well as ‘targeted interventions’ for specific sections of the community and workplaces.

The fund will incorporate targeted support for school/university outbreaks and additional non-financial support for those who are self isolating.

Other areas include providing initial support, as needed, to vulnerable people classed as ‘Clinically Extremely Vulnerable’.

Dr Rupert Suckling, director of public health at DMBC, said: “Ongoing financial support to local authorities through the Covid-19 Test and Trace Contain Outbreak Management Fund Grant was confirmed in May 2021.

“This is an extension to the previous Contain Outbreak Management Funds received in 2020/21. The fund supports proactive containment and intervention measures.

“Doncaster has also received financial allocations from an additional Contain Outbreak Management Fund allocation for 2020/21, additional support for those who are Clinically Extremely Vulnerable and Local Authority practical support.

“In total this amounts to one-off funding of £4.066 million for 2021/22.

The allocations were arrived at by considering the needs of those groups most at risk from and impacted by Covid-19 together with a consideration of the risk areas in the Covid-19 control plan.”

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