Local Bath resident, Tina Johnston, started ‘Cooking for Carers’ initiative to deliver home-cooked meals to RUH staff

‘Cooking for Carers’ Facebook group dedicated to delivering home-cooked meals to COVID-19 NHS workers at Royal United Hospital

By Lauren Forester

Tina Johnston used her panic over COVID-19 to start a ‘Cooking for Carers’ initiative between Christmas and New Year of 2020. Johnston and a group of others deliver home-cooked meals within COVID-19 guidelines and food hygiene rules to NHS staff working in the COVID-19 ward at Royal United Hospital every day at the end of their 12-hour shifts.

Johnston created a Facebook group where she posted, inviting others to join her and “show solidarity to those who are on the front line of saving covid patients.” With the help from Michelle Stephens, who created spreadsheets and rotas to ensure there is someone to cook and deliver food to RUH every day, ‘Cooking for Carers’ has now recruited over 180 members, all through the power of social media.

Johnston says, “The idea is home-cooked dinners to show our love and appreciation for what they’re doing… the altruism is a wonderful feeling… it’s love all round.”

The aims, Johnston tells Radio Bath, is to raise enough awareness and volunteers so every hospital with covid wards in the country can have an army of cooks caring for our carers. With people furloughed or isolating they now have a lot more time than before and are using their spare time to help those with less time, caring the only way they know how.

Stevens has created a rota for the next six weeks, filling it with an overwhelming number of volunteers who are putting their all into cooking magnificent and lovely dishes that are made with love.

Johnston believes that it’s absolutely essential to help NHS workers during this time and that if it can be done in Bath, it can be done up and down the country.

To find out more and join in, follow the link to the ‘Cooking for Carers’ Facebook group.