Help lift someone out of loneliness with a simple question: fancy a cuppa?

That’s the call this Mental Health Awareness Week, the theme of which is loneliness. It’s something that can hugely affect our lives and something we all experience at some point.

By asking ‘fancy a cuppa?’ we can all do our bit to reach out to someone who may be feeling lonely, whatever the reasons and whatever the time of year.

Visit the campaign website to discover the steps you can take to help yourself and those around you and where you can find further support. 

The Your Mind Matters campaign supports the emotional wellbeing and mental health of children and young people across West Sussex.

You will find resources, advice, and information about free training for young people and families, which you can access and share with others, at Your Mind Matters. 

Hear how Thought-Full Mental Health Support Teams are supporting pupils in schools across West Sussex. 

You will be unable to access some of our online services between the afternoon of Friday 13 May and morning of Monday 16 May due to planned routine maintenance work.

Our website will also be offline, and we will be unable to respond to emails sent to West Sussex County Council addresses.

During this time, if your query is urgent, you may wish to use the telephone numbers listed on our blog page to reach the service you require. You can also follow us on Twitter @wsccnews and Facebook.

If you need to use the Book To Recycle system you will be able to visit the booking site direct, in order to choose your slot.

Visits can be booked on the system up to two weeks in advance, and the usual web pages will be available up to the weekend.

Similarly, any other links to our website in this eNewsletter will not work from Friday afternoon until the website comes back online.  

We apologise for any inconvenience caused and thank you for your patience while this essential work is taking place.

Thank you to the 5,000+ subscribers who took part in our Residents’ eNewsletter survey.

Based on what you’ve told us, from next month we will move to issuing this eNewsletter once a month, unless there’s something time-critical to share.

75% of you didn’t know we produce other eNewsletters, including ones on environment and climate change, recycling, and highways, transport and planning.

See our full list of eNewsletters and sign up here.

You also let us know the subjects you’d like to hear more about and we will build your ideas into future editions – thank you.

Congratulations to Greg Mason from Worthing, the winner of our prize draw, kindly donated by the Weald and Downland Living Museum.

Organisations across West Sussex are joining forces this Dementia Action Week (16 to 22 May) to provide a range of support events and launch a new service.

The new Bilingual Memory Navigator service is being piloted to help people from ethnic minority backgrounds who care for those experiencing memory loss and dementia. 

Join the free sessions and drop-ins arranged during the week, which cover topics including financial planning, safety, and community support.

‘It’s been life-changing for us in so many good ways'.

The words of foster carers Gary and Holly, a couple who’ve been fostering with West Sussex County Council for 18 months.

This Foster Care Fortnight the couple are urging other local people to discover how fostering can change their lives and those of vulnerable children for the better.

Please watch and share Gary and Holly’s inspirational and heart-warming story.

The spring booster vaccination is available to eligible groups to help reduce the risk of people getting seriously ill from Covid-19.

You can get the booster three months after the date of your original booster if you are:

• aged 75 or over
• living in a care home for older people, or
• aged 12 or over and have a weakened immune system.

First, second, third and original boosters are also still available for anyone who is yet to have theirs.

Booked appointments and walk in sessions are available every day.

Book via the National Booking Service or call 119, which provides support in 200 languages.

For more information about the local vaccination programme, including details of walk-in sessions, click the link below.

Experience West Sussex has produced a video called ‘Meet the food and wine experts’  - a behind the scenes look at some of our local culinary creatives.