The impact of the coronavirus crisis, lockdown, isolation and social distancing has led to a parallel increase in the demand for its support and services.

In these unprecedented times, stress is a normal reaction for anybody with good mental health, but for people already living with mental illness, the additional anxiety and isolation can become a matter of life and death.

The impact on Jami’s existing service users cannot be underestimated.

With the closure of Jami’s Head Room Café and community hubs, and the restrictions placed on social interactions, the only regular social contact for some people using its services has now disappeared.

Its priority is to continue providing a service to these people and their families.

The closure of the hubs has had a profound effect on those who use these facilities for group meetings, occupational therapy sessions, peer support and social engagement.

For some people who struggle with self-care, it may be the only place they are able to get a decent meal each week.

In response to the crisis, the hub and community teams pooled their resources to launch the Community Hub Online, a weekly programme including fitness, yoga, art, singing, creative writing, interactive quizzes and religious activities.

In April, there were more than 250 participants in the online sessions.

IT equipment has been provided to service users, volunteers and staff so they can participate or run online services and keep in touch with loved ones, while redeploying Jami staff to provide technical support.

Jami’s telephone support has dramatically increased and, in the first three weeks of April, 238 hours of telephone support were given.

Utilising the Head Room Café resources alongside the hub facilities, Jami has been able to prepare meals which are delivered by staff and volunteers to people who are unable to do this themselves.

It is using this opportunity to have a doorstep chat and ensure essential human contact is maintained with those most vulnerable.

Within days of the lockdown, it opened the virtual doors of Head Room Café Online, providing a free monthly programme for people using its services and anyone else struggling at the moment.

The programme is evolving but currently the sessions running are: Peer Support Group (Mondays and Fridays), Kind Co-working (Tuesdays and Thursdays), Creativity 4All (Wednesdays) and Community Conversations (Thursdays).

For more details visit Headroomcafe.org/whats-on

Jami is resuming its recovery focused one-on-one work with initial assessments and ongoing monitoring on Zoom; redeploying Jami staff to the community team to build support capacity; and providing fitness and practice skills sessions online.

In order to support clients with their goals and to be able to extend capacity to the waiting list of people wanting to use services, it is developing recovery focused support groups with sessions on anxiety management and building routine.

People with mental health problems do not exist in a vacuum.

There is often a ‘ripple effect’ on families, creating tension and uncertainty — which places a huge strain on those taking on the role of day-to-day carer.

This has been magnified by the current crisis and the carers’ support team has transitioned its services to provide ongoing support to all carers by video or phone, manage new referrals, facilitate peer carer groups, increase telephone support to carers affected by coronavirus and is in the process of developing a new carers’ group to replace the regular Head Room Café drop-in session.

Jami’s vocational rehabilitation team has moved online, continuing support to gain skills training; formal educational qualifications, begin volunteering opportunities and mentoring/job coaching.

The education team has moved online, running both its anticipated programme of courses for Jami’s Hub service users and evening education sessions, delivering mental health webinars to the wider Jewish voluntary sector as well as new programmes focusing on the impact of the pandemic on mental health in the community.

In April it launched an online mental health service for university students, Kooth Student (Jami.kooth.com)

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