Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department has emergency plans in place to assist NHS hospitals in the event of a severe influenza outbreak this year.

As part of winter resilience planning, all National Health Service trusts have plans in place to cope with capacity and demand in the event of flu emergencies. NHS winter plans for 2018-19 were published by NHS England and NHS Improvement on 7 September 2018. These include plans to drive up levels of vaccination among NHS frontline staff to help protect patients and reduce the impact of flu ahead of the winter months.

Influenza vaccination remains the best protection against flu, and should be offered to everyone over the age of 65 years, those who are at particular risk of flu, and pregnant women, at the earliest opportunity. Influenza vaccination should also be offered to all frontline healthcare workers through their occupational health teams. This year all children between 2-9 years will be offered the nasal spray vaccine to help protect them and their families against influenza.