Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the effect on public health of people not being able to access dental surgeries during the covid-19 lockdown.
To meet the Government social distancing measures and to contain the spread of COVID-19 all routine dentistry was suspended during the height of the pandemic. All face to face urgent care was restricted to over 600 urgent dental centres (UDCs) to minimize risk of transmission and all clinically necessary treatments were still available in UDCs during the lockdown period.
NHS England and NHS Improvement advised patients to get in touch with NHS 111 or their usual dentist who provided remote advice and triaged patients needing treatment to the UDCs across England.