Covid-19: Vaccines

Lord Mancroft Excerpts

Monday 1st February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness is entirely right to be concerned, but I can report from the front line that concerns about the impact of anti-vaxxers have not materialised in a huge impact on confidence. I pay enormous tribute to all those in civic society and religious groups in all parts of Britain who have done a tremendous job of ensuring that groups and communities who might once have been suspicious of a vaccine supplied by the British Government have instead turned up in droves. I am extremely confident that the message has got across: this is a safe vaccine, everyone who qualifies should take it, and you should trust the Government and the NHS to supply it.

[Lord Mancroft (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I join my noble friend Lady Sugg in congratulating the Government on their outstanding work in rolling out this vaccine programme. As I am a bear of very little brain, can I ask my noble friend to explain: if we are to maintain the current level of first vaccinations and at the same time start giving second doses to those who have had their first, will we not have to double our capacity to give vaccinations over the next month or six weeks? Are the Government confident that they can achieve that?

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My noble friend is entirely right: from March, we will have considerably more work both to deploy the second dosage and to supply it. We have those plans absolutely in place: the supply of the vaccine has been put in place to ensure that we have a sufficient number of doses, and the workforce and locations are in place to ensure that we can deliver them.

Cannabis Oil

Lord Mancroft Excerpts

Tuesday 12th January 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, procurement decisions in the NHS are done by the NHS. I do not think that a specific or unique group is focused precisely on hormone therapies, but I would be glad to go back to the department and write to the noble Baroness to confirm that.

[Lord Mancroft (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I draw your Lordships’ attention to my interests as set out in the register. If we can vaccinate 1.5 million people in a few weeks with a drug that did not even exist a couple of months ago, how come we cannot prescribe properly a drug that has been legal to prescribe for over two years? Cannabis contains over 120 different cannabinoids and eight terpenes, and the way in which these are configured makes a world of difference to their effectiveness. What training is being given to ensure that the right combination of cannabis oil required to treat different medical conditions is correctly prescribed? I think it is time that the Government stepped up to the plate on the training.

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I would turn around my noble friend’s proposition and ask this question. If many vaccine manufacturers can turn around clinical trials in eight months for an extremely complicated vaccine, how come the cannabis-producing companies cannot turn around clinical trials over years?

Health Protection (Coronavirus) (Restrictions) (England) (No. 4) Regulations 2020

Lord Mancroft Excerpts

Wednesday 4th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Mancroft (Con) [V]]

My Lords, while in February and March there was a paucity of data on which anyone could base an opinion or construct a strategy, there is now almost a tsunami of facts and figures, along with as much commentary as anyone could want. We therefore all know just about as much as the Prime Minister does. One result of that is that the case for this lockdown, as set out by the Prime Minister and his advisers on Saturday, and my noble friend the Minister today, has since been largely debunked by enough reputable scientists and commentators to the point where the Government’s case for this lockdown is simply no longer credible. In particular, Monday’s report by King’s College, referred to by the noble Lord, Lord St John of Bletso, set out that the R rate is significantly lower than the Government’s advisers reported on Saturday. As my noble friend Lord Lilley told us, the number of new cases in the north west has plateaued and is now falling.

No one doubts the seriousness of coronavirus, but the reality is that, while this is a very nasty, frightening illness, it is really only fatal to specific vulnerable people. More than 90% of the population get over the virus within a few days or weeks at worse. In these circumstances, it is difficult to understand the case for locking down the whole community. The chaos surrounding the Prime Minister’s announcement on Saturday and the delay in tabling this statutory instrument has simply added to the uncertainty surrounding this measure and the general lack of confidence in the Government’s handling of what is undoubtedly a difficult situation. There is a large and growing body of opinion, based on the enormous amount of data now available to all of us, that believes that the cure—in the form of a lockdown—may well be more damaging than the pandemic itself.

In order to address these concerns, will the Minister share with this House the work that the Government have presumably done which convinced them that there will be fewer job losses, less economic damage, fewer long-term physical and mental health problems in the population as a result of the lockdown than there would be without it? We all recognise the need to protect the NHS, and we have been told how many lives could be saved by lockdown, but this has been based only on projections. We now also need to be told how many lives will be ruined by the economic fallout of lockdown. The heavy price of lockdown will be paid by working people, and we need to know what that price is going to be. I shall, of course, listen carefully to everything that noble Lords say tonight, but as it stands, if my noble friends divide the House, I will support them.

Medicines and Medical Devices Bill

Lord Mancroft Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 2nd September 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Mancroft (Con)]

My Lords, the purpose of the Bill before us today is set out very clearly in the Long Title and few could disagree with the Government’s objectives. Indeed, the Bill had a relatively untroubled passage through the other place. However, I am slightly confused. At least part of the motivation for improving the law and regulation in this area was the subject of the review of the safety of medicines and medical devices by my noble friend Lady Cumberlege—a first-class if somewhat harrowing report. I am therefore unclear how the Government can be entirely confident that the Bill achieves what it purports to, as it was drafted before my noble friend’s report was published.

I would like to take this opportunity to make a few comments about my noble friend’s review, because I became concerned and, frankly, pretty horrified by its findings, particularly in relation to the use and misuse of surgical mesh. We have become accustomed over the last few months to applauding outside our homes the sterling work of front-line NHS staff during the pandemic at a time when large numbers of people became very ill and required significant interventions and care in a particularly challenging environment. We were right as a nation to acknowledge the work that they selflessly undertook on our behalf.

However, my noble friend’s review sets out a description of another side of our National Health Service that we need to be equally willing to acknowledge, although it is less palatable and some people may not be willing to admit it. Everybody makes mistakes, and large, nationally delivered services are no exception. So it is important to keep things in perspective, which is not easy when we are talking about the lives of people we know, or our loved ones.

One thing that sticks out to me in the review is the extraordinary lack of data, which has been mentioned before in this debate. I can tell your Lordships that 336,000 people have been infected with coronavirus in the UK this year and that 41,000 have died—precise and tragic statistics. But I cannot tell your Lordships how many women have had their lives ruined by the insertion of medical mesh, because the National Health Service does not have those figures. It does not know how many people had those operations or how many have suffered adverse effects, although the number is probably in the tens of thousands, and certainly more than those who have died of Covid.

Doesn’t know, or doesn’t care? It is very hard to tell from the review or from talking to those who have suffered. But the language of the review bears repeating and should go on the record. I am obviously not going to quote all 267 harrowing pages, but perhaps I can take a few quotes from page 4, which cites

“lack of awareness of who to complain to and how … the struggle to be heard … not being believed … dismissive and unhelpful attitudes on the part of some clinicians … a sense of abandonment … life-changing consequences … breakdown of family life … loss of jobs … loss of identity and self-worth”.

Lastly, “inaccurate or altered patient records” is a particularly shocking remark to me. I will not go on, noble Lords have heard enough. This is not a service that we should be applauding on our doorsteps. This is a service that in this area should be hanging its head in shame.

I have two questions for my noble friend. Can he assure the House that the Bill will go a long way—a very long way—to ensuring that something like this can never happen again? Can he explain exactly how the Bill will contribute to that, because it is far from clear to me from his remarks on opening this debate. It is far from clear to me because, as many noble Lords have pointed out, it is only a skeleton Bill or a framework Bill—I am not sure what the difference between the two is.

Secondly, can he explain what steps the Government are taking now, today, to make redress to those women who have been harmed and how exactly they are doing that? I have read what my noble friend’s review recommends but have not yet heard the Government’s response, and this Bill does not cover that most important point.

Lastly, if my noble friend Lady Cumberlege moves an amendment to set up a patient safety commissioner, I shall be delighted to support her in the Lobbies.