Why Care Workers Are the Most Underrated Professionals in Britain
It’s easy to admire doctors, surgeons, teachers and other people doing jobs that make a tangible difference to our lives. But what about those whose work goes largely unseen? As we sleep in, there are some workers getting people washed and ready for the day, administering tablets to help manage symptoms and doing everything else they can to make someone feel cared for. By the time we get to that first cup of coffee, thousands of people in this caring army have been at work since dark o’clock.
If any single social issue should alert us to society’s blind spots, it is the failure to recognise the value of care work in Britain. It is as though for decades we have agreed to ignore the elephant in the room. At its simplest level, this comes down to a perception that care work is ‘unskilled’. Ask anyone who has received care or employed someone to look after a vulnerable relative if the care worker was unskilled, and you will get a sharp contradiction. Caring involves a raft of very demanding tasks: reading the signs of dementia from earliest symptoms; observing when someone is deteriorating in their health or becoming more anxious and frightened, especially when in pain; and confronting the end of their own identity or loss of independent life.
The list continues with making judgments on treatment options and when to summon the emergency services. None of these roles can be performed without deep knowledge, sound judgment and often emotional intelligence of the highest order. For Care Worker Jobs, go to https://www.caremark.ie/job-opportunities/care-assistant-job-opportunities/
We owe it to ourselves as much as to their carers to give them proper recognition, reward them fairly and invest them with all the status that accompanies their indispensable role in our society.
