Felicity Buchan
Main Page: Felicity Buchan (Conservative - Kensington)Department Debates - View all Felicity Buchan's debates with the HM Treasury
Covid-19: Ethnic Minority Disparities
Felicity Buchan Excerpts(3 years, 9 months ago)
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Kemi Badenoch
I am afraid the hon. Lady is confusing one initiative for helping to improve vaccine take-up with the vaccine take-up plan. I wrote to her in October, asking her to take part in the vaccine trials. I sent that message to the Opposition Whips Office as well as to the Government Whips Office. I took part in vaccine trials in October, and there is a big difference between taking part in vaccine trials, and being vaccine-confident. One key thing about disinformation is that people believe the Government are testing vaccines on ethnic minorities, and the messaging we need to use for vaccine trials, which the hon. Lady mentioned earlier, is completely different from that needed for a vaccine-confidence campaign. She can rest assured that those of us in government know what we are doing, even if she does not.
Felicity Buchan (Kensington) (Con)
I recently visited the vaccination centre at St Charles’ Hospital in North Kensington, and while I was there I was delighted to see that the majority of patients getting the jabs were from ethnic minorities. We have also seen a pop-up centre at the mosque, Al-Minaar, in North Kensington. Does my hon. Friend agree that we need to focus on discrete individual communities to ensure that vaccine take-up is as high as possible?
Kemi Badenoch
I agree with my hon. Friend, and that is one of the reasons we are discouraging the use of the term “BAME” when talking about these issues, as this conflates lots of different communities. We must be very specific about who we are talking about, and what their individual needs are. Various different initiatives will be tackled, based on the specific needs of community groups, and I am pleased that it looks as if there is successful vaccine take-up in her constituency.