Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment his Department has made of the adequacy of supply of (a) buprenorphine, (b) methadone and (c) naltrexone during the covid-19 outbreak.

As part of our concerted national efforts to respond to the COVID-19 outbreak, we are doing everything we can to ensure patients continue to have access safe and effective medicines. Supplies of buprenorphine, methadone and naltrexone continue to remain available.

The Department has well-established procedures to deal with medicine shortages and is working closely with industry, the National Health Service and others in the supply chain to reduce the likelihood of future shortages.

The Department shares regular information about impending supply issues and management plans with the NHS via networks in primary and secondary care and will liaise with relevant patient groups about issues affecting specific medicines, medical devices and equipment.