Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans he has to (a) monitor and (b) tackle over-reliance by asthma patients on reliever inhalers during the covid-19 outbreak.

The monitoring and prescribing of asthma medication are performed in accordance with guidance from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence to manage the condition. The guidance is available at the following link:

https://www.nice.org.uk/guidance/ng80/chapter/Recommendations#self-management

The NHS England and NHS Improvement clinical guide for the management of respiratory patients during the COVID-19 pandemic states that the majority of community respiratory services should be switched to telephone or virtual consultation. Routine annual reviews should continue virtually to reassure patients and ensure they are happy with their management plans to avoid hospital attendance. The clinical guide is available at the following link:

https://www.england.nhs.uk/coronavirus/wp-content/uploads/sites/52/2020/03/C0063-Specialty-guide-_Respiratory-and-Coronavirus-_v1_26-March.pdf