Covid-19 Update — House of Commons, 2021-12-06
Topic: Health
Sajid Javid (Conservative, Centre-right): I would like to start by welcoming the hon. Member for Ilford North (Wes Streeting) to his new position and by wishing his predecessor, the right hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth), all the very best in his new role. Throughout this national effort, I have always been grateful for how we have been able to work together across the Floor of the House in a constructive manner, and I look forward to that continuing With permission, Madam Deputy Speaker, I would like to make a statement on the pandemic. The omicron variant is continuing to spread, here and around the world. According to the latest data, there are now 261 confirmed cases in England, 71 in Scotland and four in Wales, bringing the total number of confirmed cases across the UK to 336. This includes cases with no links to international travel, so we can conclude that there is now community transmission across multiple regions of England. Beyond our shores, confirmed omicron cases have now been reported in 52 countries, with 11 countries including Romania, Mexico and Chile all reporting their first cases this weekend This is a global battle and we are playing a leading role. On Friday I spoke with the director general of the World Health Organisation to share our findings so far and discuss how we can work together to tackle this common threat. We are learning more about this new variant all the time. Recent analysis from the UK Health Security Agency suggests that the window between infection and infectiousness may be shorter for the omicron variant than for the delta variant, but we do not yet have a complete picture of whether omicron causes more severe disease or how it interacts with the vaccines, so we cannot say for certain at this point whether omicron has the potential to knock us off our road to recovery We are leaving nothing to chance. Our strategy is to buy ourselves time and strengthen our defences while our world-leading scientists assess this new variant and what it means for our fight against covid-19. Today, I would like to update the House on some of the latest measures that we are taking. First, we are taking balanced and proportionate measures at the border to slow the incursion of the new variant from abroad. We have seen with previous new variants how strong defences at the border, combined with the capacity we have built for genomic sequencing, can give us the best possible chance of identifying and responding to new variants. This includes our travel red list, which allows us to react quickly through targeted measures when the data shows cause for concern Analysis from UKHSA shows that at least 21 omicron cases in England alone are linked to travel from Nigeria, and there is a strong indication that omicron is present there. Nigeria also has very strong travel links with South Africa; it is the second most popular flight destination from Johannesburg. Based on this evidence, we made the decision to add Nigeria to the travel red list, and this came into force at 4 o’clock this morning. This means that anyone who is not a UK or Irish citizen or a UK resident and who has been in Nigeria for the past 10 days will be refused entry. Those who are must isolate in a Government-approved facility for 10 days, where they will take two PCR tests. I know that there has been a spike in demand for these facilities due to the rapid expansion of the red list and that some people have experienced issues returning home. However, we are ramping up capacity as quickly as possible. We have already brought several new hotels on board in the past few days and we expect to double the number of rooms that are available this week When this new variant is appearing in more and more countries every day, we also need to look beyond the red list and strengthen our measures for a wider range of travellers to ensure they give us the protection we need against this potential threat. UKHSA’s finding that omicron may have a shorter window between infection and infectiousness means that pre-departure testing could have a greater role to play in identifying positive cases before travel. As a result of this new data and the greater spread of omicron across the globe, from 4 am tomorrow anyone travelling to the UK from countries that are not on the red list must also show proof of a negative PCR or lateral flow test. This applies to any traveller, whether they are vaccinated or unvaccinated, aged 12 and above. They should take a test as close as possible to their departure, but not earlier than 48 hours before Of course these measures will bring disruption, and they will impact on people’s plans to spend time with their loved ones, especially over the festive period, but we are taking this early action now so that we do not have to take tougher action later and so that we can take every opportunity to prevent more cases from arriving in our country I reinforce to hon. Members that these are temporary measures while we improve our understanding of this new variant. We will be reviewing the measures, along with the other temporary measures we have announced, and we will update the House next week. I firmly believe that whenever we put in place curbs on people’s freedoms, we must make sure they are absolutely necessary, and I assure the House that we will not keep these measures in place for a day longer than we have to Secondly, as well as acting to slow the incursion of the variant from abroad, we are also strengthening our vital defences here at home. Late last week we had the brilliant news that another new treatment has been approved by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency after it was found to have reduced hospitalisation and death in high-risk adults with symptomatic covid-19 by 79% Another defence, of course, is our vaccination programme. On Saturday we recorded almost 450,000 booster jabs in a single day, and yesterday we announced that we had hit the significant milestone of 20 million booster doses and third doses across the United Kingdom. In the past week the UK booster programme has reached more people than the adult population of Greater Manchester, and we are expanding this life-saving programme even further as part of our target of offering all adults in England a covid-19 booster jab by the end of January. To put this plan into action we will be recruiting 10,000 more paid vaccinators. We are also deploying about 350 military personnel in England this week to support the vaccine booster programme, and there are already more than 100 personnel deployed in Scotland to support their vaccination efforts. We will have more than 1,500 pharmacy sites putting jabs into arms across England, along with new hospital hubs and new vaccination centres. We are bolstering our booster programme so that we can protect as many people as possible, strengthening our collective defences as the virus goes on the advance this winter One of the most dangerous aspects of covid-19 is how quickly it adapts. When the virus adapts, we must adapt, too. We cannot say for certain what omicron means for our response, but we can say that we are doing everything in our power to strengthen our national defences so we will be as prepared as possible for whatever this virus brings I commend this statement to the House.