Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department has taken to record instances of covid-19 contracted in hospitals.

NHS England and NHS Improvement collect data as part of a daily SITREP on the time between admission to hospital and first positive swab for COVID-19. Since October 2020, NHS England and NHS Improvement have published relevant data relating to COVID-19 hospital activity which includes the numbers of people diagnosed in hospital with or admitted to hospital with COVID-19. This data covers the period from 1 August 2020. Data relating to the number of patients diagnosed in the community and subsequently admitted to hospital, or admitted to hospital and diagnosed with COVID within eight days after admission is also available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/covid-19-hospital-activity/

Given the incubation period of the virus and local differences in application of testing protocols, it is not possible to definitively determine the number of people who contracted the virus while in hospital in England to date.