Covid-19: Government Response

Baroness Neville-Rolfe Excerpts

Wednesday 6th May 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell]

The Government’s commitment to isolation is spelled out clearly in guidelines published by Public Health England, and it is promoted every day with the Government’s “stay at home” slogan. On the 200,000-test aspiration, we have put in place a remarkable platform for testing. We have strong partnerships with important companies, we have sourced new supply chains of critical reagent swabs and other supplies that are in short measure, and we are making the logistical arrangements necessary for a massive expansion of testing. I believe that those will take us to whatever is necessary to meet the testing needs of the country.

[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

My noble friend has described a situation that is still worrying. The rate of deaths and of new infections is still much higher than we wish, and we may soon be faced with a situation where the rules in different geographical locations or in different institutions vary, so we need more information. To enable us to seek optimum changes, could he please publish more information—for example, on how many cases came from hospitals and where, how many involve hospital or care workers, and how many involve other key workers, overseas visitors, self-isolators and the like?

[Lord Bethell]

The Government have gone about the Covid crisis with a great amount of transparency; a very large number of figures are published every single day. I am afraid that some of the questions my noble friend asks are beyond the reach of measurement in our statistical accountability at the moment, but I completely take on board and celebrate her call for transparency. We are working as hard as we can to get as many numbers out to the public as possible.