Legal aspects of COVID-19 pandemic management for community nurses

At present, attention is firmly fixed on ‘the community’. What does that mean in reality? The coronavirus directly impacts both the vulnerable and their carers. Deaths resulting from contracting the virus are losses to their families, and they are losses to the community, which brings community nurses into immediate focus. What does that mean in practical terms? What does it mean to say that, if you are or have reason to suspect you are infected by coronavirus, you must ‘distance’ yourself from it, yet still remain part of the community?

In a previous issue of the British Journal of Community Nursing, the author reviewed working hours and injuries caused by lifting accidents in community nursing (Finch, 2019a; 2019b). Both involve the wider duty that the law places on managers and employers to create and maintain a safe system of work. Such a system requires safe equipment, safe premises reliable employees and a safe system of working conditions.