Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the effectiveness of covid-19 safety measures put in place to allow visitors to care homes.

The decision to resume regular indoor care home visiting was a clinically-led approach taking into account the surveillance of COVID-19 and the risks of transmission and infection. The COVID-19 safety measures in place represent a balance between the risk of infections and the importance of visiting for the physical and mental wellbeing of residents and their families. Our priority has been and continues to be the prevention of infection in care homes to protect staff and residents.

Enhanced data collection has been put in place to monitor the impact of visits and to ensure that any adverse impacts across the system are rapidly detected. The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies’ Social Care Working Group will also be undertaking an assessment of how well the overall suite of safety measures have worked. The Department will use this to inform future policy.