Covid-19

Earl of Clancarty Excerpts

Thursday 23rd April 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell]

The noble Lord, Lord Robathan, makes a fair point. I reassure him that we are investing in a massive 20,000-person surveillance by the ONS to get to the bottom of the mystery which he describes. Every piece of evidence we have from every country around the world suggests that the number of people who have been through the disease is a tiny proportion of the population, and that the amount of recovery and antibody immunity in the country is likely to be in single figures. This is one of the great challenges of the virus and the situation it presents to us.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, a test, track and trace policy is clearly right, but a week ago, Matt Hancock admitted that 15,000 people a day are entering the UK through airports without medical checks. In just over a month’s time, that will be an extra half a million people entering the country, many of whom may have Covid. Will the Government address this and plug what is surely a gap in their Covid policy?

[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.