Covid-19: Care Homes

Baroness Wheeler Excerpts

Thursday 17th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I completely sympathise with the point on those in care homes receiving a very tough challenge when they have been prevented from seeing loved ones. We have had to take extremely severe infection control measures, many of which are still in place for the reasons that have been discussed in this Chamber before. But I challenge the noble Lord’s point on testing. We brought in testing when asymptomatic infection was recognised and when the capacity was available.

[Baroness Wheeler (Lab)]

My Lords, can the Minister explain why the Secretary of State continues to justify himself by quoting the seriously underestimated PHE January to October 2020 data assessment on hospital discharges to care homes of 286 Covid deaths? The National Care Forum of care providers has repeatedly made clear how fundamentally flawed and incredibly partial that data is. Only limited numbers of symptomatic patients in hospitals and care homes were tested, and cases not tested before death are not included. Even the chair of the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee has said that relying on this for a full picture of the situation is a stretch of the imagination. We owe it to the people who have died, their relatives and care home providers to have full, accurate and independent information. How is the Minister going to ensure that it is urgently provided, so that we can genuinely learn from what happened?

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I acknowledge the noble Baroness’s concerns, but the PHE report is extremely thorough. I am not aware of it being revised, but if it is, I would be glad to share that information with the noble Baroness.