Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Kamall on 29 September (HL2638), what assessment they have made of the higher hospitalisations and fatalities relating to COVID-19 recorded in England, compared to those reported in other Western European countries; and what were the main conclusions of any such assessment.

The UK Health Security Agency has not made this comparative assessment. Direct international comparisons of COVID-19 hospitalisations and fatalities in countries are complicated by a range of different factors such as the proportion of the population vaccinated, the timeliness of the vaccine delivery, non-pharmaceutical interventions and compliance and differences in reporting of key COVID-19 epidemiological metrics in different countries. Even when using several indicators, comparisons between countries should be carried out with caution.