Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that Cheshire and Wirral Partnership NHS Foundation Trust has adequate stock and future supply of remdesivir to help treat covid-19 patients.

Remdesivir has been granted a conditional marketing authorisation for use in hospitalised patients with COVID-19, pneumonia and on supplemental oxygen. NHS England and NHS Improvement have published an interim commissioning policy, which specifies the clinical criteria for use in the National Health Service. The United Kingdom is participating in a joint procurement for remdesivir that has been arranged by the European Commission and the NHS currently has sufficient stock for use in line with the published clinical criteria.

In addition to remdesivir, the corticosteroids dexamethasone and hydrocortisone have been proven through clinical trials to be effective treatments for patients with COVID-19. The UK has secured supplies of both drugs for use in COVID-19 and they are now routinely available to NHS patients.