It’s times like these when our communities are at their best!

June is one of our retirement living residents in Coventry. She recently expressed her anxiety after a visit to a local shop where the shop assistant sneezed in front of her. With all the publicity about COVID-19 she became very worried that she could have potentially been put at risk of catching the infection.

Meanwhile, Kevin, a Retirement Living Team Leader in the area, had just issued a plea to local services asking them to make contact with him if they had anything set up to support the more vulnerable people in the region to obtain food and the response he received over the phone was completely overwhelming.

With so many kind offers of support, June immediately sprung into Kevin’s mind - although he knew she liked to remain independent from those who usually offer her the additional support she needs (her family), he realised she had become fearful of placing them at risk. In addition, Kevin was also aware of Junes’ health problems that make it difficult for her to get out and about without some pain and discomfort, and so he knew she was definitely one of the residents in his locality that would really benefit from the generous offers of help from the wider community.

Kevin got in touch with Doreen, Junes’ Service Delivery Officer, who called her to let her know of a particular offer of support from The Good Neighbour Service, who were only too happy to drop off a food parcel to her from the Coventry Foodbank.

June gladly contacted The Good Neighbour service, which is run by a local voluntary church group, to put the wheels in motion, and told us how “blown away” she was by their very friendly approach and desire to serve.