We are proud that King’s College London’s Guy’s campus and Guy’s & St. Thomas’ Hospital is one of the central London COVID-19 vaccination centre sites. Here at King’s, staff and students have been contributing their expertise and energy to pandemic problem-solving and collaborating with our local partners and communities who were a vital part of our response. People and the Pandemic provides the opportunity to find out more about some of their powerful stories and is testament to King’s dynamic approach to research and its civic mission.
Professor Reza Razavi, Vice President & Vice-Principal (Research) at King's College London and the Director of Research at King’s Health Partners
31 March 2021
People and the Pandemic: King's collective response
Highlighting the human stories behind King’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic
One year after the announcement of the first lockdown in March 2020, vaccination sites around the UK are a cause for hope in signalling the next milestone in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic.
King’s College London’s Guy’s campus and Guy’s and St. Thomas’ Hospital is one of the central London COVID-19 vaccination centre sites, and people from across King’s – researchers, staff, students and the wider community – have been involved in the response to COVID-19, with vaccination being the tip of the iceberg.
People and the Pandemic is a collection of texts, quotations and podcasts highlighting the human stories behind King’s response to the pandemic and emphasising the many facets and interdisciplinary nature of pandemic problem-solving in a dynamic and emerging situation.
An outdoor installation at the Colonnade and Boland House on Great Maze Pond, part of King's Guy’s campus aims to enhance people’s experience of getting vaccinated, many of whom are from King’s home boroughs of Westminster, Southwark and Lambeth – and provide an insight into the work of the university over the past year.
An online collection of stories provides King’s wider community with the opportunity to explore its response and breakthrough research in detail. Here, podcasts are documenting first-hand accounts of King’s community at the frontline of problem-solving during the past year.
To name but a few: Discover the story behind REACH, investigating the impact of COVID-19 on young people’s mental health; hear from students who were among the hundreds of King’s medical, dental and nursing students who volunteered or graduated early to join the frontline work; learn more about the ZOE symptom app, downloaded by over four million people in the UK; get inspired by student Karim Ali’s Funnel Support Network; and read about digital initiatives here in London, empowering Latinx parents and supporting Gypsy, Roma and Traveller students to continue their education from home, and internationally, where King’s Global Health Partnerships supported Africa’s COVID-19 response.
It seems extraordinary that a year has passed since we first went into a national lockdown. The King’s community has shown great commitment to each other and to tackling the many societal and scientific issues the pandemic has brought to the fore. I am very proud of everyone here at King’s for their part in our collective response and would like to thank all colleagues and students who have been dedicating their time to the NHS and elsewhere at the frontline of the UK’s COVID-19 response.
Professor Evelyn Welch, Interim Principal and Provost (Arts & Sciences)
In this story
Former Senior Vice President (Service, People & Planning)
Vice President (Research)
Related departments
- Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience
- Faculty of Life Sciences & Medicine
- Faculty of Dentistry, Oral & Craniofacial Sciences
- Faculty of Social Science & Public Policy
- Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery & Palliative Care
- Faculty of Arts & Humanities
- King’s Global Health Partnerships
- King’s Culture
- Service at King’s
- King’s & London