COVID-19 Health Impact Assessment
The impact of COVID-19 on Isle of Wight residents from the start of the pandemic to October 2021
On 11 March 2020, the World Health Organisation declared COVID-19 a pandemic. SARS-CoV-2 is a newly emergent virus causing COVID-19 disease. Even now there is still much more to understand.
The impacts of COVID-19 will be felt for many years, and some may still not yet be realised. Over a year on, these reports look at the impact COVID-19 has had on the residents of the Island.
Isle of Wight COVID-19 Health Impact Assessment October 2021
This report looks back at the implications of the pandemic on our local population. It reviews national guidance and policy to date. It looks at what the potential impacts have been, and will be, on our populations. COVID-19 has identified existing, and created new inequalities in health and social care needs. People across the UK, and indeed the world, have been harmed by the virus in very different ways.
Both the first and second waves of the pandemic have brought challenges. We need to understand how it has affected different population groups in different ways. Also how we minimise the negative impacts and maximise the positive benefits.
Isle of Wight COVID-19 Business Vulnerability Index November 2021
So we can try to understand how the impacts have affected our communities, a business vulnerability index has been developed.
It gathers data from a range of sources identified from statistics and literature published during COVID-19 in 2020. It provides an assessment of the relative impacts across the area.
The indicators aim to capture the employee and business aspects of the impacts which arose from the COVID-19 restrictions. The sector, size, mobility of customer and location of a business were found to determine the vulnerability of a business. The impacts of the pandemic disproportionately affected physical and small businesses, with online and larger firms being more likely to survive.
Isle of Wight COVID-19 Mental Health and Wellbeing Index October 2021
So we can try to understand how the impacts have affected our communities, a mental wellbeing index has been developed.
It gathers data from a range of sources identified through statistics and literature published during COVID-19 in 2020. The population groups who were affected most by the non-pharmaceutical interventions during the early stages of COVID-19 may not have had any mental health challenges beforehand. They may not live in areas typically associated with poor mental health, such as areas with high levels deprivation. Regardless, there is evidence that aspects of the restrictions could have taken a toll on their mental health.
The Index includes measures on:
- Demographics
- young people aged 16 to 24 were most likely to be furloughed, and reported greater levels of loneliness,
- ethnic minority groups most likely to experience anxiety around contracting COVID-19 due to:
- their employment sector,
- disproportionately high rates of poor health outcomes from COVID,
- more likely to live in overcrowded or multigenerational housing,
- and less likely to have access to green space.
- Health
- people with two or more long term health conditions were most likely to feel anxiety about contracting COVID-19 and were more likely to be shielding.
- Economic
- low earners were more likely to be furloughed, and have increased financial stress,
- people employed in either health care or industries most impacted by furlough such as accommodation, food service, arts, entertainment and recreation,
- people who are self-employed who may not have received financial support if criteria not met.
- Living situation
lone parent households with dependent children where they had to balance home working and home schooling. They may also have had financial stress.
renters are more likely to be lower earners, younger and experience loneliness,
single member households aged 65+ are more likely to experience loneliness,
people living in institutions or communal establishments such as prisons, care homes or hospitals