Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, to protect the clinically extremely vulnerable by making pre-exposure prophylaxis (PREP) available in the UK; and whether this policy is dependent on a budgetary consideration.

The Antivirals and Therapeutics Taskforce is scoping pre-exposure prophylaxis, with the Prophylaxis Oversight Group, the UK Health Security Agency and RAPID C-19. The Taskforce provides recommendations to Ministers based on the available evidence and advice from these expert groups. RAPID C-19 provide recommendations on clinical policies, while the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency is responsible for authorising medicines.

This includes the identification of patient groups which could benefit, determining potential deployment and administration processes and evaluation of any such products. Treatments must be clinically cost-effective and demonstrate sufficient efficacy against the Omicron and new variants to avoid mutations. Any plans to introduce prophylaxis is dependent on this evidence and value for money. Vaccines are recommended for those at high risk and the majority will be well protected by vaccination. Prophylaxis would not be introduced in place of vaccination.