Covid-19 Update

Chris Grayling Excerpts

Wednesday 30th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

We will vaccinate NHS and social care staff as soon as we can. They are, of course, in the priority list. They are in priority group 2, except for social care home staff, who are in priority group 1. The groups are all set out according to clinical need. That is the basis on which we will vaccinate. We will also vaccinate at pace, which often means that spare vaccines that are left at the end of the day in a hospital or primary care setting are used to vaccinate staff who are to hand, where that can be done. That is being done right now. In short, the answer is that we are trying to do this as quickly as we possibly can.

[Chris Grayling (Epsom and Ewell) (Con) [V]]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend and his team on the work they have done to put us in such a relatively strong position to vaccinate in the coming months, and I pay tribute to the team here at the Epsom and St Helier University Hospitals NHS Trust for the work that they are doing at the moment. This area has been in tier 4 for 10 days, and there is a continuing acceleration in the number of infections reported locally. By definition, those are not happening in the business premises that were closed as a result of moving to tiers 3 and 4. What information does the Secretary of State have about where these infections are being transmitted under tier 4?

[Matt Hancock]

The majority of infections happen within the household, from one person in a household to another. That is, perhaps, inevitable, because we are physically closest to those with whom we live. Over the last 10 days, it has not yet been possible to do a full analysis of where we think the transmission is happening within tier 4. The reason for that is simply that the data are not available, and the data are particularly difficult to interpret over the Christmas period. I am very happy to keep talking to my right hon. Friend to try to understand as much as we can about where the transmissions are happening, because that is the route to keeping them under control in the least damaging way possible until we can complete the vaccine roll-out.