Covid-19 Update

Baroness Uddin Excerpts

Monday 21st September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Uddin (Non-Afl) [V]]

My Lords, 50,000 is a frightening enough number but SAGE has made public pronouncements that, as we approach the winter, up to 500,000 people or more may display Covid and flu symptoms. With schools and universities returned, there is nationwide concern about this increasing exponentially, as the Minister has said. We have heard that some schools and universities are already facing partial closure. What specific advice has been issued to NHS front-line staff, including GPs, so that they are vigilant and adequately prepared to respond to the needs of teachers and families—particularly those within ethnic minority communities—who are deemed at higher risk of being affected by this dangerous disease? Regarding the Help Us to Help You campaign, is the Minister working closely with ethnic minority communities in particular? They have obviously been disproportionately affected, and we want to avoid that continuing, at all costs.

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness is quite right to raise the question of the Help Us to Help You campaign and the work that is being focused on hard-to-reach communities, whether BAME communities or other communities where we struggle to get some of our health messages through. I reassure her that there is an enormous focus on getting these important messages through to those who are particularly vulnerable to the effects of Covid, and who we have to work harder to reach.