Covid-19 Update

Siobhan Baillie Excerpts

Wednesday 30th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Matt Hancock]

I have just announced the need to move a significant proportion of England into tier 4 restrictions, and I welcome the implicit support for that measure. Where it is possible to keep some of the freedoms that we all cherish, we should do so, and that is the basis for our tiered approach.

I of course welcome the hon. Lady’s support for the roll-out of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine, which will happen right across the UK from Monday. It has been a pleasure working with Jeane Freeman, the SNP Government’s Cabinet Secretary for Health in Holyrood, to ensure that this vaccine, which has been bought, developed and supported effectively by UK science right across the country, can be deployed properly to everybody in the whole of the UK on a fair and equitable basis according to their clinical need. I look forward to working very hard to make sure that happens.

[Siobhan Baillie (Stroud) (Con) [V]]

Many businesses in Gloucestershire are gutted to be placed in tier 4. This makes the roll-out of the vaccine even more important. However, there is a worrying increase in anti-vax information in Stroud that is causing a lot of distress and upset for local people. It is appalling that our Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust had to spend its precious time during this pandemic defending itself against films on social media that were wrongly claiming that the hospital is empty. Will the Secretary of State assist me to reassure Stroud about the vaccines and encourage people not to share covid information from unofficial sources to stop this dangerous, damaging and disrespectful behaviour?

[Matt Hancock]

Yes, I strongly agree with my hon. Friend, who speaks very powerfully about the need for proper, authorised information about these vaccines, which save lives. We have been very careful to ensure that the independent regulator makes the decision on how these vaccines should be deployed, and indeed whether they should be deployed, and it is confident in their safety and their efficacy. It is that information, and all the information that is set out by the NHS, that people should look to if they have questions—if they want to know how and why the vaccine works, and who it should be used for. I pay tribute to all those who work in the hospitals of Gloucestershire. It is hard work at the moment in the NHS. Rates of coronavirus in Gloucestershire have really shot up over just the past two or three weeks, and unfortunately that is why we have had to take the action that we have on restrictions. I want to thank all of the NHS for doing all the work that it has been doing over Christmas and will have to do over the weeks ahead.