Covid-19 Update

Jeremy Hunt Excerpts

Monday 29th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

I, too, extend my best wishes to the shadow Health Secretary and wish him a speedy recovery.

I have to say that I think the hon. Lady has misjudged the tone of the House. This is a very serious matter. The whole country will be looking for all Members of this House to work together and support the nation. Surely she is not blaming the UK Government for the emergence of the new variant. Perhaps she was just auditioning for the reshuffle that is going on in her party right now.

The hon. Lady asked about international donations. The UK is leading the world on international donations—quite rightly. It is absolutely right that that be treated as a priority. We would like to see other countries step up as well. A few months back, the Prime Minister pledged 100 million donations by June 2022, 80% of which will go through COVAX, of which we are a huge supporter; 20% will be made bilaterally. So far, we have donated over 20 million doses—more than many other countries. COVAX, which we helped found, and which we support, has donated, I believe, some 537 million doses to 144 countries.

The hon. Lady asked about the rules on travel and masks, and other rules that I set out. I think I have addressed that. I believe that the measures are proportionate, and that this is a balanced response. We have just set out a huge expansion of the vaccine roll-out programme, and it is a shame that the hon. Lady could not find it in herself to welcome that. As I said, I will set out more details in coming days on exactly how we intend to meet the requirement to vaccinate more.

On antivirals, we are one of few countries in the world to have procured the two leading antivirals. Our independent regulator, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, was the first in the world to approve one of those antivirals. I am pleased with the over 700,000 courses that we have for citizens across the United Kingdom, but of course, given the emergence of the new variant, we will be reviewing that and seeing if more needs to be done.

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

The late Donald Rumsfeld coined the phrase, “known unknowns”, and that is what we face with the new omicron virus. The Secretary of State is therefore absolutely right to take sensible and proportionate measures to buy time while we wait to understand how dangerous this new variant can be, but does he not agree that the fact that we face this danger is a symptom of the failure of western countries to make sure that vaccines are distributed adequately around the world? I recognise the enormous contribution that the UK has made through COVAX, the development of the AstraZeneca vaccine and so on, but is it not a moral and practical failure that while richer countries have managed to vaccinate 60% of their populations, for poorer countries the figure is just 3%?