Covid-19 — House of Lords, 2021-01-28
Topic: Health
Natalie Evans (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness and noble Lord for their comments. Like them, my thoughts and sympathies are with every family that has tragically lost loved ones during this terrible pandemic The noble Baroness asked about working with local government. I assure her that we are working extremely closely with local government, and indeed many partners. This is a national endeavour, uniting local and national government, the NHS and many more. Over the past few months, we have recruited and trained a vaccination work force of 80,000, including retired clinicians, the Armed Forces, pharmacists and volunteers. Over 200,000 members of the public and businesses have offered non-clinical support and help with the logistics of the programme I can certainly assure both the noble Baroness and the noble Lord that we are doing everything we can to roll this programme out as smoothly as possible. We are sharing data to ensure that priority groups around the country are receiving their vaccines as quickly as possible. We have vaccinated over 80% of the over 80s, and 75% of elderly care home residents. Vaccinations are now being offered to everyone over the age of 70 The noble Lord, Lord Newby, asked about an investigation or inquiry into the handling of the pandemic. As the Prime Minister has said, we will turn to that, but at the moment I hope he understands that we have other priorities that we are working on The noble Baroness once again rightly asked about schools. We have bought 1.3 million devices and delivered over 870,000 to schools in England so far during the pandemic. We bought an additional 300,000 laptops and tablets this year, increasing our investment by another £100 million. We have spent over £400 million supporting disadvantaged children who need help with access to technology. I fully recognise that there are people who will fall, and currently are still falling, through the gaps, but we are working closely with our school partners around the country to try to make sure that all families and all children have access to the technology that they need. The noble Baroness asked about vaccine prioritisation. It is an issue that many have rightly raised. I reiterate that the JCVI advises that the immediate priority for the vaccination programme should be to prevent deaths and protect healthcare staff, with old age deemed the biggest single factor determining mortality. That is why we are following the advice of the independent body. The top four priority groups account for 88% of Covid deaths I say to the noble Baroness that the ONS has looked at rates of death involving Covid in men and women who work as teaching and education professionals. They were not statistically significant when compared to the rates seen in the population among those of the same age and sex. I know that sounds slightly bureaucratic, but we are looking at the data and have taken advice from the JCVI. There is a reason for the prioritisation, although I entirely accept that there are many groups who would like to have the vaccine as soon as possible. That is why we are rolling out the programme as we are The noble Lord and the noble Baroness asked about the international travel situation, as announced by the Home Secretary yesterday. The noble Baroness asked a number of questions. There will be further information and details set out next week, so I am afraid that I am not able to provide any additional information than that provided yesterday. But we will introduce a new managed isolation process in hotels for those who cannot be refused entry, including those arriving home from countries where an international travel ban has already been imposed. Further details about this policy will come next week—we are working as quickly as possible across government and industry to bring these measures in Both the noble Lord and the noble Baroness asked about test and trace. We have contacted over 7 million people who may otherwise have spread the virus through the system, and we have reached 86.7% of those testing positive, so the system continues to work and improve The noble Lord asked about support for those self-isolating. As he will be well aware, there is a one-off £500 test and trace support payment, which helps those on low incomes who are self-isolating, and we have extended that until the end of March. In total, more than 4 million people could be eligible to receive this support payment. In addition to that, accepting that not everyone is covered by it, we have provided £25 million funding to local authorities to make discretionary payments to those facing financial hardship who are not eligible for the £500 scheme. We have also made statutory sick pay available from day one, while making emergency changes to reimburse small and medium-sized businesses with two weeks of sick pay per employee. Of course, we continue to support the lowest paid with a temporary universal credit uplift worth £1,000 The noble Lord asked about our future plans. The reason why the Prime Minister set out the end of February as when we will return with a plan is that at this point we do not yet have the data on the impact of the vaccine rollout on case rates, hospitalisations and deaths, which will be vital in determining the timeline to releasing the measures. By mid-February, we will know much more about the effect of vaccines in preventing hospitalisation and deaths, using data from both the UK and nations such as Israel. We will know how successful the current restrictions have been in driving down infections and we will know how many people are still in hospital with Covid. We intend to look at all that data and information and will set out the results of that and publish our plan for taking the country out of lockdown when we announce that on the week of 22 February Our aim will be to set out a gradual and phased approach towards easing restrictions in a sustainable way, beginning as we have said with the reopening of schools, which is our national priority. We hope to commence the reopening of schools from 8 March with other economic and social restrictions being removed after that.