Covid-19

Jeremy Hunt Excerpts

Wednesday 6th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I thank SEN schools, their staff, parents and pupils for everything that they are doing—and all the work that is being done, by the way, by teachers across the country to continue to look after the children of key workers and vulnerable kids. The point that the hon. Lady makes about vaccination is one that many colleagues across the House have made, bringing forward the case for this or that group. It is vital that we as politicians leave that to the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, which is driven by a desire to stamp out the disease as fast as possible and to reduce mortality.

[Jeremy Hunt (South West Surrey) (Con) [V]]

I fully support these measures and recognise how difficult the decisions are. Before Christmas, we were told that testing was happening at the Public Health England facility at Porton Down that would tell us within a couple of weeks whether the vaccines worked against the new strain. Would the Prime Minister update us on the latest on that, and if there is a glitch with the vaccine programme, are we implementing a plan B involving, for example, mass testing of high-transmission areas, deprived communities and so on so that we can properly isolate as quickly as possible anyone who could transmit the virus?

[The Prime Minister]

There is no reason to think that any new strain of the virus is vaccine resistant. On my right hon. Friend’s point about testing, I can say that mass lateral flow testing in communities across the country will continue to be rolled out, because we still believe in its usefulness.