Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what assessment he has made of the potential effect of the reduction in official development assistance on the logistics, delivery and rollout of a covid-19 vaccine in active conflict zones in (a) northwest Syria, (b) northeast Syria and (c) Yemen.

Despite financial pressures, the UK remains a leading humanitarian donor, having committed over £3.7 billion to the Syria crisis and more than £1 billion to the Yemen responses since the conflicts began. COVID-19 continues to pose a particularly significant threat in Syria. The UK is one of the leading donors supporting UN and International Non-Governmental Organisation (INGO) partners to deliver vital healthcare, water, sanitation and hygiene activities across Syria, all which help to mitigate the threat posed by COVID-19. UK support to the COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access (COVAX) facility has seen the first batch of 203,000 vaccine doses delivered to Damascus and 53,800 doses to north west Syria on 22 April.

In Yemen, in partnership with the World Bank and WHO, the UK will fund roll out costs for nearly 2 million doses of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine allocated to Yemen via the COVAX facility. The first batch of 360,000 doses was delivered on the 31 March.