Covid-19: Ethnic Minority Disparities Debate

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Department: HM Treasury
Monday 1st March 2021

(3 years ago)

Commons Chamber
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Kemi Badenoch Portrait Kemi Badenoch
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I thank the hon. Lady for her question. I know that Health Ministers are taking this issue seriously; it is something that cuts across our briefs. I have taken a particular interest because of my own experience of having three children within the maternal health sector. Following a joint ministerial roundtable in September 2020, the race disparity unit, which reports to me, has been supporting the Department of Health and Social Care in driving positive actions in maternity services to improve outcomes for ethnic minority women. That includes the recently launched NHS campaign “Help us help you”, which informs pregnant women about the importance of attending check-ups, and provides reassurance that the NHS is there to see them safely, because covid has affected the way that maternity works in the NHS. We are hoping that as we continue to unlock and come out of this, things will go back to normal.

Kate Kniveton Portrait Kate Griffiths (Burton) (Con) [V]
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We all know that vaccination is imperative for protecting lives and for economic recovery. I am therefore concerned about the low vaccination take-up among the BAME community. In Burton, there is a campaign targeted at reaching anyone from the BAME community who should have been vaccinated but has not, and a pop-up vaccination clinic has been arranged for this Friday at a local mosque. May I urge my hon. Friend to ensure that resources are available for further work to reach out to those communities and ensure more clinics in communities where take-up is low?

Kemi Badenoch Portrait Kemi Badenoch
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We are ensuring that public health messages are accessible, and are published in a large number of media that ethnic minorities read, watch and listen to. That will be critical in ensuring that the message gets to all communities, especially those that are harder to reach. I am pleased to hear about the vaccination efforts in Burton, and that local mosques are being used. This is a good time to re-emphasise that local efforts will be key in driving vaccine uptake. It cannot all be done from Whitehall and Westminster. We are delivering communication on the channels that we believe people from ethnic minorities use, and are communicating through individuals such as religious and community leaders, as I have mentioned. The DHSC has also set up regular interviews with clinicians for more than 20 ethnic minority newspapers and programmes, including The Voice, BBC Asian Network, Al Jazeera, British Muslim TV, Zee TV, Hamodia and the Jewish Chronicle.