Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 8 December 2022 to Question 97699 on Coronavirus: Immunosuppression, what the clinical guidance is to enable clinicians determine what constitutes exceptional circumstances in order for the antiviral Sotrovimab to be prescribed for immunosuppressed individuals.
Answered by Will Quince
Recent guidance from the World Health Organization indicates that Sotrovimab does not neutralise the currently circulating COVID-19 variants and subvariants. NHS England has reviewed the clinical access policy for this drug which may still be considered as a treatment option where other available antiviral treatments are unsuitable.
Sotrovimab will now be prescribed by exception only where its use is supported following a multi-disciplinary team assessment. The revised clinical policy is available at the following link:
https://www.cas.mhra.gov.uk/ViewandAcknowledgment/ViewAlert.aspx?AlertID=103218
Asked by: Lord Roberts of Llandudno (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many NHS staff to date have died as a result of contracting COVID-19.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Office for National Statistics’ data shows that from 9 March 2020 to 31 March 2022, there were 796 registered deaths involving COVID-19 among healthcare workers in England aged 20 to 64 years old, using their last known occupation. The definition of healthcare workers includes those employed in the National Health Service and healthcare sector workers.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to take steps to extend the NHS and Social Care Life Assurance Scheme 2020 to include support for (a) NHS and (b) social care staff who have (i) a long-term disability due to a covid-19 infection and (ii) Long Covid.
Answered by Will Quince
The NHS and Social Care Coronavirus Life Assurance Scheme provided financial security to the families of frontline National Health Service and social care staff who died from COVID-19 contracted in the course of performing their duties. While the NHS and Social Care Coronavirus Life Assurance Scheme closed to new claims on 31 March 2022, it will remain open until 31 March 2023 to allow for outstanding claims which occurred whilst the Scheme was open. Financial and welfare support is available to support those affected by chronic healthcare conditions and who are unable to work.
Asked by: Wes Streeting (Labour - Ilford North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when he plans to resume publication of the paused (a) Critical Care Bed Capacity and Urgent Operations Cancelled and (b) Delayed Transfers of Care data set.
Answered by Will Quince
Information on critical care bed numbers and occupancy has been published by NHS England from Thursday 24 November as part of a weekly summary of the Urgent and Emergency Care Daily Situation Reports.
The Critical Care Bed Capacity and Urgent Operations Cancelled data collection was paused, along with other official statistics, due to the coronavirus pandemic and the need to release capacity across the National Health Service to support the response. NHS England will keep the paused collections under review to establish at which point further collections should be reinstated and update published information when the status of any of the collections change.
The quarterly Cancelled Elective Operations official statistics publication has resumed, and data for Q2 2022-23 last published on 10th November.
Data on hospital discharges is now collected through the acute daily discharge sitrep and is published monthly. These reports can be found at the following link:
https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/statistical-work-areas/
Asked by: Baroness Merron (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will seek the advice of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) on coronavirus immunisation treatment using prophylactic antibodies.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) is an independent expert advisory committee which provides advice to Government on immunisation. The JCVI’s remit is focused on vaccination, rather than antibody treatments and prophylaxis, therefore there are no plans to commission such advice.
The multi-agency RAPID C-19 was established in 2020 to ensure treatments for COVID-19 are made safely available for National Health Service patients as soon as possible. RAPID C-19 has the relevant expertise in the range of therapeutic options available for COVID-19 treatment and prevention. It also draws on relevant expertise, including an NHS expert working group and the Prophylaxis Oversight Group.
Asked by: Lord Mendelsohn (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the position that coronavirus vaccines and immunizations, including prophylactic antibodies, should be assessed through the JCVI.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
No such assessment has been made. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) is an independent expert advisory committee which advises United Kingdom health departments on immunisation. The JCVI’s remit is focused on vaccination rather than antibody treatments and prophylaxis.
The multi-agency RAPID C-19 was established in 2020 to ensure that treatments for COVID-19 are made available safely to National Health Service patients as soon as possible. RAPID C-19 has the relevant expertise in the therapeutic options available and consults experts in an NHS expert working group and the Prophylaxis Oversight Group. The Chief Medical Officer for England has agreed that Evusheld should be referred to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence for further evaluation, which is underway
Asked by: Christopher Chope (Conservative - Christchurch)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 8 November to Question 73787 on Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme: Coronavirus, how many requests for medical records relating to claimants for vaccine damage payments have been outstanding for more than (a) one month and (b) six months; and if he will make it his policy that such requests be complied with as if they were subject access requests.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
As of 8 November 2022, there were 755 claims awaiting the provision of medical records for at least one month. Of these, 157 claims were awaiting records for over six months. The NHS Business Services Authority can submit subject access requests to healthcare providers after a specific period, unless there has been an agreement for a timeline for the provision of records.
Asked by: Christopher Chope (Conservative - Christchurch)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 8 November 2022 to Question 77275 on Coronavirus: Vaccination, what (a) criteria and (b) guidance is used by medical assessors to ensure the consistency of assessment across cases of (i) multi-system inflammatory syndrome and (ii) other auto-immune responses as a result of a covid-19 vaccine when interpreting the criteria of the (A) Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme, (B) schedule 2 of the Social Security (General Benefit) Regulations 1982 and (C) section 103 of the Social Security Contributions and Benefits Act 1992.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
All claims are assessed using a consistent approach, regardless of the type of case. To ensure consistency, the NHS Business Services Authority has recently introduced sampling to quality assure medical assessments. This allows claims to be progressed more rapidly while ensuring the high standards required, in line with Schedule 2 of the Social Security (General Benefit) Regulations 1982 and Section 103 of the Social Security Contributions and Benefits Act 1992.
Guidance and resources to support medical assessments include but are not limited to the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency’s data such as Yellow Card reports; vaccine product information updates; the Green Book; other research; and systematic reviews such the Cochrane library.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an estimate of the level of covid-19 infections as of 8 November 2022; and if he will make an assessment of the impact of the level of covid-19 infections on NHS services.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
The Office for National Statistics’ Coronavirus (COVID-19) Infection Survey publishes weekly estimates of the number of positive cases among the population living in private households in the United Kingdom. The most recent estimate for the week ending 11 November 2022 is available at the following link:
No formal assessment of the most recent levels of Covid-19 infections and the impact on NHS services has been made. However, on 4 August 2022, the Government published ‘Direct and indirect health impacts of COVID-19 in England: emerging Omicron impacts’ which analyses the impact on National Health Service critical care capacity and secondary care, which is available at the following link:
Asked by: Diana Johnson (Labour - Kingston upon Hull North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many (a) NHS and (b) social care staff have died from covid-19 since 9 March 2020.
Answered by Robert Jenrick
Data published by the Office for National Statistics shows that between 9 March 2020 and 31 March 2022, there were 796 registered deaths involving COVID-19 among healthcare workers and 1,243 deaths among social care workers in England aged 20 to 64 years old, using the last known occupation.
The definition of healthcare workers used will include both those employed in the National Health Service and other healthcare sector workers.