Covid 19: Winter Plan

Debate between Baroness Evans of Bowes Park and Lord Kakkar

Tuesday 24th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kakkar (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I draw attention to my declared interests. In his Statement in the other place, the Prime Minister made reference to the imminent initiation of a mass vaccination programme for the UK population. Have Her Majesty’s Government considered creating a prospective research cohort from among the millions of citizens who will be vaccinated in the early months of this programme? This would facilitate individual follow-up and invaluable data collection, better inform our understanding of pandemic epidemiology and provide invaluable insights into the future development of novel vaccine platforms.

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord for his question, and I also pay tribute to all the fantastic work that has been done in relation to the vaccinations. Indeed, obviously a lot of research and testing has been done to develop the vaccines. We will certainly learn from that as we roll out the vaccination programme, and from his very useful comments and observations about things we may consider. I am very happy to take that back to the department of health, which I am sure will be considering these things and talking to experts, such as himself, throughout the industry to make sure that we roll out this programme as effectively as possible.

Covid-19 Update

Debate between Baroness Evans of Bowes Park and Lord Kakkar

Tuesday 3rd November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ashton of Hyde (Con)]

My Lords, I remind noble Lords that this time is meant for questions not statements, which will allow all noble Lords who want to to get in.

[Lord Kakkar (CB) [V]]

My Lords, I draw attention to my registered interests. The lockdown for the coming month in England must achieve a substantial reduction in coronavirus circulation in the community so that hospitals are not overwhelmed by Covid-19 admissions and are able to continue to admit Covid-19 and non-Covid patients requiring urgent and elective care in future. How will Her Majesty’s Government use this one-month period better to prepare our National Health Service and our public health systems to secure these objectives so that further lockdowns will not be necessary?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

The noble Lord is absolutely right. Concerns about pressure on the NHS were one of the key drivers behind the decision made as well as the fact that, unfortunately, we are seeing in some areas of the country a small number of non-elective procedures having to be cancelled, and we absolutely do not want that to happen. That is why during this time opticians, pharmacies and GPs will stay open, and we will continue to urge people who need any type of medical opinion, attention or treatment to continue to attend appointments and see professionals. We are ramping up testing capacity. We are providing millions of items of PPE, £3 billion of funding to make sure the Nightingales can provide surge capacity and £300 million to make sure that departments have the funding they need to upgrade ahead of the winter and ensure that the NHS is not overwhelmed.

Covid-19 Update

Debate between Baroness Evans of Bowes Park and Lord Kakkar

Wednesday 14th October 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

My noble friend is absolutely right to talk about care homes, and I can certainly reassure him that no care homes should be forced to admit residents they do not feel they can provide appropriate care for. Also, all individuals must be tested before discharge from hospital into a care home. I hope I can reassure him by letting him know that we have provided over 208 million items of PPE and are giving every care home free PPE until at least the end of March. We are also piloting weekly testing for professionals who visit care homes regularly and come within one metre of residents when carrying out their roles, so that we can do everything we can to ensure that infection rates do not rise exponentially within that sector.

[Lord Kakkar (CB)]

My Lords, I draw attention to my registered interests. The noble Baroness the Leader of the House made reference to Nightingale hospitals. Is she in a position to advise your Lordships on what measures were taken and how the Nightingale hospitals have been prepared during the summer months, with specific reference to the provision of protective equipment, clinical equipment, advanced therapeutics and, most importantly, human resource staff, so that they are now immediately able to make a contribution to the management of this second wave of Covid-19? In particular, I ask if, and how, a clinical protocol has been established to ensure that the Nightingale hospitals can be deployed for the management of not only Covid-19 but other diseases, in such a way that the NHS can continue to deliver?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

As I mentioned in reference to a comment by the noble Lord, Lord Newby, CT scanners have been made available—for instance, in Harrogate and Exeter—to provide safer, faster access for people with a range of conditions, including cancer, so that we can continue to try to ensure that routine appointments and operations can still take place. As I also mentioned, three other hospitals are now on alert in areas of high prevalence in order that they can come on stream. Obviously work is going on between the Department of Health and NHS England, but they will be staffed from the local area. We will of course keep all of this under review because we know that capacity is important, and the Nightingale hospitals will, I am sure, once again play an important part in our response as we go forward.

Covid-19

Debate between Baroness Evans of Bowes Park and Lord Kakkar

Wednesday 23rd September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kakkar (CB)]

My Lords, I join others in thanking the noble Baroness for taking questions on the Prime Minister’s Statement, and in so doing draw your Lordships’ attention to my declared interests.

The first wave of Covid-19 earlier this year saw major challenges for the NHS, in being able to treat patients with non-Covid conditions, such as cancer and cardiovascular disease, while dealing with the large numbers of patients needing admission for acute Covid conditions. How will Her Majesty’s Government determine whether the measures now in place are having sufficient impact to be confident that the NHS will be able to manage not only patients requiring Covid-19 admissions but those with non-Covid conditions requiring urgent treatment during the winter? This is a critically important issue. Do they have modelling available? How will they determine if these measures are going to have the desired impact and, if not, how will they act to ensure that the NHS will be able to look after all patients, both Covid and non-Covid?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

I assure the noble Lord that the department is working extremely hard with the NHS to ensure an absolute minimum of disruption to other treatments. It was thanks only to the incredible work of staff that, even at the peak of demand earlier this year, hospitals were still able to look after two non-Covid patients for every Covid patient. A similar picture was seen in primary, community and mental health services. The most effective way to ensure that other treatments are not disrupted is to make sure we tackle this disease and try to make sure we do not have huge numbers of hospitalisations of patients with Covid. We are working towards that. We are also working on the principle that the most urgent treatments, including mental health support, should be brought back first. I assure the noble Lord that is a priority for the department.

Covid-19 Update

Debate between Baroness Evans of Bowes Park and Lord Kakkar

Thursday 25th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kakkar (CB) [V]]

I thank the Leader of the House for taking questions on this Statement. Although testing of symptomatic individuals and tracing their contacts represents an important approach to controlling the spread of Covid-19 disease in the community as lockdown restrictions are lifted, there may be an alternative approach: mass population testing to identify both symptomatic and asymptomatic individuals carrying the SARS-CoV-2 virus in the community, with them being isolated if they test positive. Such a testing strategy would need to be delivered locally and to provide the results in real time to facilitate maximum workplace participation and consumer confidence. What assessment have Her Majesty’s Government made of the emergent technologies that could facilitate this population approach? What provision has been made for the necessary logistical arrangements that would need to be adopted to test the entire population on a repeated and regular basis?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park]

The noble Lord obviously knows a lot about this area. He is right that a series of strategies will need to be used for us to continue to make progress in combating this virus. The Department of Health is looking at an array of issues with SAGE and the medical advisers, so work is ongoing in the area that he suggested, as well as in developing track and trace, because we are going to need all these different strands to come together to beat this virus and make sure that all areas are able to clamp down if we start to see a sudden resurgence in any area. I am sure we all want to avoid going into a national lockdown again if the virus were to start to reappear.