Covid-19 Update
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(3 years, 7 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
I am afraid I do not agree with the prognosis. We are, of course, very careful to ensure that the vast majority of people who go through the managed quarantine service—hotel quarantine—have a good experience. Of course, they have to be in a hotel when often they would rather not be, so it is an unusual situation, but it has been put in place with great sensitivity and I am very grateful to all those who have worked so hard on it, not just in my Department but among the hotels, the airports and the carriers. However, the hon. Gentleman clearly has some significant individual concerns, and I would be very happy to ensure that the Minister for Public Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill), meets him to hear those individual concerns and to try to make sure that they are resolved—in particular the point about ensuring that food provision is appropriate for those fasting at Ramadan, which of course is very important.
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con) [V]
Given that the seven-day rolling average of covid deaths is now 24.9, with just 10 yesterday, and that in normal times the daily cancer death toll averages over 450—a figure sadly likely to rise due to delayed treatment and the disruption of the pandemic—what are the Government doing to catch up with the cancer screening and operations backlog and get the health service back towards other medical conditions so that the death toll from non-covid cases does not become the worst legacy of this emergency?
Matt Hancock
My hon. Friend is quite right to ask about that; it is an incredibly important topic. I am pleased to say that, over the second peak this winter, the amount of cancer work—surgery and treatment—continued much closer to normal. He is quite right that, in the first peak, it was reduced significantly. We are very focused on the backlog that has been created by the pandemic, but I am pleased that the death toll from covid is coming down. In fact, the very latest data, published today, shows that the number of deaths recorded with covid after 28 days is four. Those numbers tend to be lower at the weekend, and we mourn each of them, but that nevertheless reinforces his point that it is vital that we get on with getting through the backlog that has been created by the pandemic.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(3 years, 9 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
The challenge with the proposal the hon. Gentleman puts forward is that vaccinating those who are not as vulnerable to the disease before those who are more vulnerable would essentially increase the overall clinical vulnerability to the disease. I am glad that the hon. Member for Leicester South (Jonathan Ashworth) did not raise this issue as health spokesman on the Labour Front Bench, although I know others on the Labour Front Bench do so. We have to follow the clinical order of priority, because my priority is saving lives.
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con) [V]
Further to the Prime Minister’s suggestion yesterday in Batley that we may not see a return to different regional tier restrictions due to the virus’s behaviour, how will the Government avoid unfairly disadvantaging areas with low covid rates? Or does the fantastic vaccination programme roll-out mean that the whole country can now make steady progress out of lockdown together?
Matt Hancock
That is our goal—that the whole country can make steady progress together. In fact, case rates across the UK are more similar in all parts of the UK than they have been for some time. There were significant regional variations over the autumn, but that is much less widespread now, hence the comments that the Prime Minister made yesterday.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(3 years, 10 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
We distribute the vaccine supplies that are available according to population, so it is based on the Barnett formula. In Scotland, of course, the Scottish NHS is delivering. A fair population share of vaccine is available to the Scottish NHS—that is available right now, so the stocks are there—and then it is for the NHS in Scotland to do the vital work of making sure that each and every one of those jabs gets into somebody’s arm and helps to protect lives.
Julian Sturdy [V]
The vaccination programme in York is making encouraging progress, with the first doses of the Oxford vaccine having arrived last week and Askham Bar and Haxby centres delivering injections in line with the priority list, which is fantastic news. However, can the Secretary of State reassure me that every care is being taken to ensure that smaller GP practices in rural areas are in no way disadvantaged in scheduling their patients for vaccination relative to the larger urban practices?
Matt Hancock
Yes, of course. Small or large, rural or urban, we need GPs to be vaccinating right across the country, and that is what is happening. We are organising it through what are called primary care networks, which are groups of GPs that cover between 30,000 and 50,000 patients. The reason we are doing that is so that each of a group of GP practices can contribute some staff to the vaccination team so that they can carry on with the other vital work that they are doing. The networks are of course larger in more sparsely populated parts of the country such as North Yorkshire, but nevertheless we have put in place the commitment to everybody having a vaccination centre within 10 miles of where they live, to make sure that we reach all parts.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(3 years, 11 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
We are absolutely determined to build back better. That needs to involve tackling long-term underlying health inequalities. A huge programme of work will be needed to do that, after the pandemic has demonstrated those inequalities.
People in Gateshead have done a great job of getting the case rate down. Like other areas, it is still in tier 3—we are not quite there yet. I know that my team and the hon. Lady’s local director of public health have been talking about getting Gateshead and the rest of the north-east into tier 2 when we can. I hope that we can do that, but for now, let us be cautious and keep this under control.
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con) [V]
There will naturally be disappointment across Yorkshire as many areas stay in tier 3. I appreciate that York’s tier will be affected by the current virus picture, but which of the five criteria will the city of York have to improve on to stand a good chance of moving down a tier in future reviews? Will that depend significantly on how our neighbouring local authorities perform against the five criteria?
Matt Hancock
We do look at those human geographies because many people commute from North Yorkshire into York, but York and many of the local authorities around it have done an absolutely fantastic job of bringing the virus under control. In York, the case rate is 65 per 100,000—a bit higher than we typically take places into tier 1. For instance, Herefordshire is 45, which is the same level Cornwall was when it was put into tier 1, but York is moving in the right direction. The over-60s case rate is also low. There has been some pressure, as my hon. Friend knows, on the hospital, but that is abating. Therefore, York and large swathes of North Yorkshire are moving in the right direction. I urge everybody right across North Yorkshire to stick at it.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(3 years, 12 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
Yes, there will be a widespread public information campaign about these new tiers. It is on all of us to follow the rules in our local area. Notwithstanding the rules, we all need to behave in a responsible way, because we all have a role in controlling the spread of the virus.
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con) [V]
As the Government continue to impose further unprecedented restrictions on people’s freedoms, it is important to give people hope and justification. As York’s covid rate continues to fall and is the lowest in Yorkshire, can the Secretary of State outline how we can get to tier 1 as fast as possible? Will he publish the assessment and the data based on which York was placed in tier 2, so that we can best judge how to get to tier 1? He talks about regular reviews, but a weekly review would be much more desirable.
Matt Hancock
Yes; I can answer positively on all counts. We have a regular weekly session to go through all these. I am committing to regular reviews rather than weekly ones simply because we sometimes have to do it more than weekly, especially if cases are shooting up in an area. On my hon. Friend’s point about publication, we have published today not only the data—and we will publish more data on each area—but an explanation of the reason for the decision taken in each area. I know that he and colleagues across York have worked hard, because there was quite a serious spike in York, and it is coming down at the moment. Overall, we still require the whole of North Yorkshire to go into tier 2 because the case rates are still elevated right across it, and we all need to work together to get them down.
Covid-19: Winter Plan
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(4 years ago)
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Matt Hancock
It is absolutely vital that we vaccinate fairly across this country—across the whole of the UK— according to clinical need. That is the agreement that we have reached among the four nations. It is the principle that I am determined to follow, given that, obviously, the UK vaccination programme will cover the whole United Kingdom. On that basis, we have agreed a fair allocation of vaccine so that vaccination can occur at the same speed in all parts of the country according to clinical need.
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con) [V]
Given the big sacrifices that York residents have made to get the virus down locally, does the Secretary of State accept how unfair it will feel if the city is kept in high tier restrictions even when our covid rate is considerably lower than it was when we entered tier 2 and one of the lowest in our regions? Does he agree that the new restrictions policy has to give people hope that self-discipline and resilience will be rewarded?
Matt Hancock
Yes, those values are important and should be rewarded. I hope that, in the areas of the country where the case rate has really come down a long way and is coming down fast, we will see the fruits of that effort. Having said that, it is absolutely critical that areas that need to go into tier 3 do so in order to get the case rate down and to protect the population. We will take these judgments based on public health advice over the forthcoming days. The reason that we have not set those details out today is that the more data we have the better. We want to give businesses time to plan to be able to reopen, but, at the same time, we do want to take into account the very latest data. In York, as in some other parts of the country, the number of cases is coming down, and I welcome that, but I want to see a few more days’ data before we can take those final decisions.
Covid-19 Update
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(4 years ago)
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Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con) [V]
I welcome the roll-out of mass testing and the vaccine update. It is very positive news and offers the hope that the country needs to get back to normality as quickly as possible. Given the unique challenges of infection control in university cities, which my right hon. Friend has touched on already, will the wider roll-out of mass testing be available across university cities such as York for the whole population?
Matt Hancock
Yes, the roll-out and the 10% of population per week availability of lateral flow tests is available to directors of public health right across the country. If that has not already been organised with York, I urge the director of public health in York to come forward and work with the team to make that happen.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(4 years, 1 month ago)
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The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)
The NHS’s recovery approach is restoring urgent cancer referrals and treatment to at least pre-pandemic levels and building capacity for the future. Latest data from July suggests that urgent two-week-wait GP referrals are back to over 80% of pre-pandemic levels.
Matt Hancock
I know the Royal Surrey and I enjoyed visiting it, albeit in the rain, in December last year with my hon. Friend. The Royal Surrey is carrying out some of the most cutting-edge treatments for cancer. We have put extra funding in—a more than £200 million fund—for the use of advanced technology for treating diseases such as cancer, and she will have seen that I announced to the House yesterday that we are engaging with the best regulators around the world as we leave the European Union to ensure that we get cancer treatments to the frontline as fast as is safely possible.
Julian Sturdy
York Hospital, like a lot of others, experienced a fall in cancer referrals at the height of the pandemic as a result of residents having stopped going to consult their GP. There is real concern among health professionals in York about the knock-on consequences of that and the rise in the backlog of cancer referrals locally. What steps can the Secretary of State bring forward to assist NHS trusts such as York’s to ensure that the backlog does not lead to late diagnosis of cases, worsening cancer outcomes?
Matt Hancock
My hon. Friend raises a very important point. As I mentioned in response to the first question, we now have referrals back up to over 80% of pre-pandemic levels, but we need to get that up further, because we all know that early diagnosis saves lives. I am also very glad to be able to report that in July, on the latest data, over 90% of patients saw a cancer specialist within two weeks of a referral from a GP, and 95% of patients receive treatment within 31 days of a decision to treat, so those referrals are leading to the action that is necessary. It is very important that the message goes out that the NHS is open, and anybody with a concern over cancer should come forward and they can get the treatment in a safe way that can help to save their lives.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(4 years, 8 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Matt Hancock)
The systems that we have in place are already securing access to effective new medicines for many thousands of NHS patients—for instance, cystic fibrosis patients through the drug Orkambi. Our commitment to getting new drugs into the NHS through an innovative medicines fund will further expand the access to medicines for NHS patients.
Julian Sturdy
My right hon. Friend is aware that two children in my constituency have families who are self-funding the cannabis drug Bedrolite, which is their only means of controlling their severe epilepsy. He has very kindly agreed to meet me to discuss their case, but what action is being taken to make Bedrolite available on the NHS for families such as the two in my constituency for whom this really is the last resort?
Matt Hancock
My hon. Friend is right to raise this issue, and I look forward to meeting him later this month to discuss it. These are desperately difficult cases. We have to trust doctors to make the right clinical decisions for each individual patient. Two licensed cannabis-based medicines have recently been made available for prescribing on the NHS. We keep working hard with the health system, and with industry and researchers, to improve the evidence base. Also, the costs need to be brought down by industry. Last week, the Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill), held a roundtable with leading industry figures. I look forward to continued work to make sure that we can get these drugs to the people who need them.
Wuhan Coronavirus
Debate between Julian Sturdy and Matt Hancock(4 years, 9 months ago)
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Matt Hancock
Currently, there is no further need for the draw-down of funding. However, conversations with the Treasury have taken place to ensure that all the funding that is necessary will be available, if it is needed outside existing departmental budgets.
Julian Sturdy (York Outer) (Con)
I thank the Secretary of State for his statement and for keeping us updated on the situation in York. I appreciate that Public Health England says that it is making good progress in identifying everyone in York who has had close contact with the two patients, but it would be reassuring for my constituents and residents in York to have a precise timeline of how long the process will take and when it expects that to be concluded. Can the Secretary of State give us that information?
Matt Hancock
The process of contacting those who have been in contact with the two people who have so far tested positive for the virus is rapid and ongoing—it is a matter of days to complete and get in contact with all those people. This is an ongoing operation and it will be concluded soon. I will let him, the House and the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) know as soon as we can make that information public.