The president of the Consell de Mallorca, with the councillor of Social Welfare, Guillermo Sánchez, wanted to see first-hand the work of this service that attends to the homeless in Palma.

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Professionals of the UMES of IMAS

To get to know first-hand the workings of the Social Emergency Unit (UMES) and the reality of the people who find themselves in a street situation in Palma. With this objective in mind, the president of the Consell de Mallorca, Llorenç Galmés, and the councillor of Social Welfare and president of the Institut Mallorquí d’Afers Socials (IMAS), Guillermo Sánchez, went out last night with the UMES, an IMAS service run by the Red Cross that provides itinerant day and night care for the homeless in the city of Palma and the Bay of Palma. The Christmas holidays are a particularly difficult time for people who have lost their homes, and the situation of poverty in which a large part of society lives becomes even more visible.

President Llorenç Galmés stressed that “this outing has been very enriching because it has given us a new perspective on one of the key services of the Consell de Mallorca’s social insertion network. Seeing directly the situation of the most vulnerable people and exchanging opinions with the professionals during the routine, has allowed us to acquire a vision of the reality that goes beyond what we can get with the papers or what the technicians can explain to us” and concluded that “we will continue to support the UMES to guarantee the basic needs of the homeless, and we will do so with full knowledge of how the day-to-day life of this service is lived”.

This year, to date, the UMES has attended to 1,960 people, 427 women and 1,533 men. The interventions cover basic needs (delivery of blankets, food or hot drinks), socio-health and emergency actions (distribution of condoms and syringes, admission to hospitals and shelters) or socio-educational actions (information, referral to services and centres, accompaniment to make arrangements and ongoing monitoring).

In this regard, councillor Guillermo Sánchez explained that “as well as working to ensure that basic needs are covered, the UMES team and professionals from the IMAS Social Inclusion area coordinate daily to assess the different cases, draw up an individual intervention plan and accompany them during the process, based on their potential and abilities. We want each person to be able to access the most appropriate and necessary resources according to their situation”.