My elderly parents live around 2 hours from me and my sibling. Both my sibling and I are classed as "vulnerable" being high-risk pregnant and asthmatic (me) and severely asthmatic (sibling), and so we are not venturing out and are getting grocery deliveries.
We've been checking on on our parents virtually. Unfortunately my mother is a very difficult woman at the best of times, and try as we might, we have not been able to prevent her from 'popping to the shops', taking her car in for a service and meeting up with a friend in their 90's! It is quite frustrating. She is still pretty able and seems to think she's invincible. We have been extremely clear about what she needs to do, and we have also helped organise local grocery deliveries and the offer of support from a local community group to ensure that things can be brought to them and so there is no need at all for her to go out. They have a lovely garden so they can sit out there all day safely. Our father is in very poor health and also has dementia, so my mother does almost everything in terms of cooking and looking after him. He can slowly walk and gradually get himself dressed but needs guidance as he gets confused. Prior to Coronavirus happening we were thinking about his next steps and had decided that a conversation about a care home ought to happen with our parents, but this got put on hold with everything that happened.
Anyway, my mother reported that she had a cough 2 days ago, but this has since disappeared. My sibling suggested that if our mother gets ill and has to go into hospital, that they would have to come out of isolation to go up and look after our father. However my sibling has very severe asthma and I really don't think this would be sensible. As much as my father would need looking after if my mother was taken into hospital, it seems the wrong choice to put my sibling at risk.
Does anyone know what people can do on this situation? If my father remained well (ie no Coronavirus) then we wouldn't want him to use up a valuable hospital bed, but at the same time our mother is his carer and if she ends up in hospital he will need caring for somehow.
What is the possible solution here in the current climate and has anyone else experienced this?
(By the way there are no other family members).