Living with Covid-19

Lord Bishop of Coventry Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd February 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

I thank my noble friend. He is right that our plan for living with Covid prioritises moving to a world where the country manages Covid like other respiratory diseases. Our response is underpinned by four principles: living with Covid by removing restrictions while encouraging safer behaviours; protecting those most vulnerable to Covid; maintaining resilience to be able to spot and respond to new variants; and securing innovations and opportunities from our Covid response, including investment in life sciences.

[The Lord Bishop of Coventry]

My Lords, thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Londesborough, earlier this afternoon your Lordships’ House considered the matter of global vaccine equity, and my sense was that, in many among the House, there was a feeling that more could be done on that front. Would the Leader say whether the Government also feel that more might be done to ensure vaccine equity in the UK itself, as an expression of the noble and laudable commitment to levelling up?

[Baroness Evans of Bowes Park (Con)]

Certainly, we have been very focused on targeting those communities which have not taken up the vaccine as much as we would like—for a whole array of reasons. For instance, we have invested a further £22.5 million in a community vaccine champion scheme to support 60 local authorities with the lowest take-up, following a £23 million investment in the initial scheme. We have vaccine ambassadors speaking 33 languages between them who are promoting uptake across the country. The recently launched Office for Health Improvement and Disparities will systematically tackle the top preventable risk factors associated with ill health and improve the public’s health and health disparities.