Role of community organisations in supporting people’s health and wellbeing during (and beyond) Covid-19
/A research report from Nesta, Healthcare Improvement Scotland’s ihub and Outside the Box has explored the role of community organisations in supporting people’s health and wellbeing during the Covid-19 pandemic. It also asks what insights and learning can help understand how to sustain, strengthen and grow community organisations’ role in supporting people’s health and wellbeing in the longer term.
The report emphasises the responsiveness, adaptability and levels of trust (from their communities) that community organisations have had when supporting people. It also highlights that the community-led response benefited from the rapid funding response in which regulations were relaxed and community organisations trusted to ‘get on with it’, as well as stronger partnership and co-ordination between sectors.
In order to ensure that these positive developments are built on in the longer-term, the report makes the following recommendations (summarised):
That community organisations are enabled to participate in local collaborative infrastructures with statutory organisations so that their expertise is integrated into local strategic plans.
Statutory organisations establish quick, simple funding processes
Incresased focus of all partners on shared local outcomes rather than outputs
That the Scottish Government informs national and local policies that help organisations form new partnerships, share resources and manage risks together, and invests in addressing the long-term consequences of Covid-19
Investment in equitable access to digital infrastructure
Download Community Health and Wellbeing: Sustaining and strengthening the role of community organisations beyond the initial Covid-19 response.
More information
Similar themes to the above research, including concerns about ongoing sustainability of already hard-pressed community organisations, are covered in SCDC’s evaluation of Foundation Scotland’s Response, Reslilience and Recovery fund which can be downloaded from Foundations Scotland’s website.
CHEX’s briefing from July 2020, The Right Foundations, which argues that by building on the fantastic community-led response to Covid-19 and by making use of great ways for everyone to take part (e.g. citizens assemblies) we can build a more just and sustainable country which really begins to tackle long-term health inequalities.
