Covid-19

Baroness Altmann Excerpts

Thursday 23rd April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell]

The noble Earl, Lord Clancarty, is right that our present guidelines state that those arriving in Britain should isolate if they have symptoms and seek a test from a hospital if it develops seriously. It is clear to me that the way we travel around the world is set to change dramatically in the future, but the CMO has reviewed our airport and port guidelines. He is happy with them, and the evidence suggests that this is not currently a source of new infections in the UK.

[Baroness Altmann (Con)]

My Lords, may I press my noble friend on treatment, particularly with convalescent plasma? As I understand it, other Governments are urgently looking into this. France has put its medical staff into LFB. Have we put any pressure on BPL, which is the only fractionating company available in the UK, to produce pure, hyperimmune immunoglobulins, rather than the whole plasma, so that we can start parametric testing of IVIG and injections of convalescent plasma in the pure hyperimmune form?

[Lord Bethell]

I reassure my noble friend Lady Altmann that we are making this a massive priority. It has huge advantages over other therapeutics because it is plasma and can therefore have an accelerated regulatory advance. I signed for procurement of £20 million-worth of fractionating machines last week to help the blood transplant service create the hyperplasma to which she alludes.