Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Baroness Merron on 17 March (HL5423), what plans they have to treat or cure the estimated 1.8 million people suffering from long Covid in the period to March 2024 and those additional people who have contracted the disease since that date.

NHS England has invested £314 million since the start of the pandemic to provide care and support for people with long COVID. This includes establishing specialist clinics throughout England to assess adults, children, and young people who are experiencing long-term effects due to COVID-19 infection. A further £86.7 million of funding was included in integrated care board core allocations for 2024/25, and specific regional funding was also allocated for assurance and system support.

To support clinical leadership in this area, NHS England has worked in partnership with the British Society of Physical and Rehabilitation Medicine to develop a new Clinical Post-COVID Society to facilitate the ongoing sharing of best practice and to support people affected by long COVID. Further information on the Clinical Post-COVID Society is available on their website, in an online only format.

Between 2019/20 and 2023/24, through the National Institute for Health and Care Research and the Medical Research Council, we have invested over £57 million on research into long COVID, with almost £40 million of this through two specific research calls on long COVID. The funded projects aim to improve our understanding of the diagnosis and underlying mechanisms of the disease and the effectiveness of both pharmacological and non-pharmacological therapies and interventions, as well as to evaluate the effectiveness of clinical care.