Wuhan Coronavirus

Jason McCartney Excerpts

Thursday 23rd January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, the advice will be available today in Mandarin and Cantonese. The UK is heavily engaged in the WHO response and, of course, we are engaging with the Chinese Government. That engagement principally happens through the WHO, which has well-established procedures to make sure we understand the nature of the outbreak so that scientists can investigate the epidemiology and come to an evolving scientific analysis of what is happening. We then base our decisions, as much as possible, on the scientific advice that flows from that. The chief medical officer, who is an expert on these issues, is co-ordinating the work here in the UK.

[Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)]

Many UK universities, not least my local Huddersfield University, have strong links with the Wuhan University of Science and Technology. What particular advice is the Secretary of State’s Department giving to UK universities, particularly those with a large Chinese student population?

[Matt Hancock]

We are not giving them specific advice. We are giving the same advice to everybody, which is to avoid all non-essential travel to Wuhan, but I am happy to take away the point that we should communicate, through Universities UK, with all UK universities to make sure the message gets to students directly so that they hear the advice that is there for everybody, which is to avoid all but essential travel.