Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his department is taking to ensure that its review into the effect of covid-19 on BAME communities engages with (a) stakeholders and (b) people with lived experience.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Public Health England (PHE) published its review report ‘Disparities in the risk and outcomes of COVID-19’ on 2 June. The review looked at different factors including ethnicity. The report can be viewed at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-review-of-disparities-in-risks-and-outcomes
The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has announced that the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Equalities (Kemi Badenoch MP) will be leading on next steps, working with PHE and others.
Professor Kevin Fenton from PHE has been engaging with a significant number of individuals and organisations within the black, Asian and minority ethnic community over the past couple of months, to hear their views, concerns and ideas about the impact of COVID-19 on their communities. The valuable insight he has gathered will inform the work the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Equalities is now taking forward.
Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what supply chains for personal protective equipment are available to independent care homes that are not able to be part of NHS procurement channels.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are working around the clock to give the social care sector and wider National Health Service the equipment and support they need to tackle this outbreak.
We have made personal protective equipment (PPE) available to designated wholesalers for onward sale to social care providers and delivered further PPE to local resilience forums (LRFs) to help them respond to urgent local spikes in need across the adult social care system and some other front-line services, where providers are unable to access PPE through their usual, or dedicated wholesaler routes.
The National Supply Disruption Response operates a 24-hour helpline that can also respond to emergency PPE requests.
Finally, we are rolling out a PPE Portal to help primary and social care providers to order critical PPE. This been tested with the sector and is now being scaled up nationally over the coming weeks. During this phase of the roll-out, general practitioners, small residential social care services (care homes with 24 beds or fewer), and small domiciliary care providers will be invited to register on the portal.
The full weight of the Government is behind this effort and we are working closely with industry, social care providers, the NHS, and the army to ensure the right equipment continues to be delivered.
Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that there is an adequate supply personal protective equipment in the event of a second covid-19 peak later in 2020.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are working around the clock to give the National Health Service and social care sector the equipment and support they need to tackle this outbreak.
The Government is working to expand supply of personal protective equipment (PPE) from overseas, improve domestic manufacturing capability and expand and improve the logistics network for delivering it to the front line. The Government has recently signed contracts for the manufacture of over 2 billion items of PPE through United Kingdom-based manufacturers, including aprons, facemasks, visors and gowns.
Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the effect of the part-privatisation of NHS Supply Chain on that organisations' ability to ensure adequate provision of personal protective equipment during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
Supply Chain Coordination Limited (SCCL), the management function of NHS Supply Chain, is a company wholly owned by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, to whom it is accountable and responsible. It aims to deliver significant savings to National Health Service frontline services through leveraging the buying power of the NHS and reducing unwarranted price variation.
A new personal protective equipment (PPE) supply channel has been set up by the Government to focus on securing supplies of PPE to meet the urgent volume requirements for PPE items. This is a dedicated and totally separate PPE supply channel, allowing NHS Supply Chain to focus on ensuring the supply of medical devices and clinical consumables to the NHS. The dedicated PPE supply channel will remain in place for as long as is required.
Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans his Department has to develop a national strategy for tackling health inequalities in England as part of recovering from the effects of covid-19.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Government remains committed to levelling up and spreading opportunity around this country – this will be an important part of the economic and social recovery from this pandemic.
The recent review published on 2 June 2020 by Public Health England, ‘Disparities in the risk and outcomes of COVID-19’, illustrates that some people are significantly more vulnerable to COVID-19.
We are looking very closely at the health inequalities aspects of this report as part of the work that is being led by the Exchequer Secretary to the Treasury and the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Equalities (Kemi Badenoch MP) to further understand the impacts.
Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to (a) protect and (b) support BAME medical staff working in the NHS during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS Employers, working in partnership with key stakeholders, published guidance for employers on 30 April. The guidance detailed how to carry out risk assessments particularly for vulnerable groups, to understand the specific risks staff members face from exposure to COVID-19 and actions which employers can take to keep staff safe.
NHS England and NHS Improvement issued directions to the service on 29 April recommending all trusts to undertake appropriate risk assessments for their Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) staff and to put in place any measures to protect and support their BAME staff. They have since developed a five-point programme to address the concerns of BAME staff, covering protection of staff, engagement with staff and staff networks, representation in decision making, rehabilitation and recovery, communications and media.
The Department has commissioned Public Health England to complete a rapid review to understand disparities in COVID-19 infection across the population. This will include looking at the impact on different ethnic groups.
Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department plans to take to ensure stocks of medicines for end of life do not run short.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
As part of our concerted national efforts to respond to the COVID-19 outbreak, we are doing everything we can to ensure patients continue to access safe and effective medicines, including those used in end of life care. The Department is working closely with the pharmaceutical industry, the National Health Service and others in the supply chain to help ensure patients can access the medicines they need, and precautions are in place to reduce the likelihood of future shortages.
NHS England and NHS Improvement have advised clinical commissioning groups to establish local hubs to ensure rapid access to anticipatory medicines. These hubs could be a community pharmacy, primary care network (general practitioner practice), community hospital, acute or other setting where palliative medicines (including controlled drugs) can be safely and legally stored and rapidly released when needed.
The Department and NHS England and NHS Improvement have published a standard operating procedure (SOP) for the use of medicines labelled for one patient, who no longer needs them, to be used by another person, in hospices and care homes. This will protect the medicine supply chain and ensure that patients can access critical medicines at end of life. The SOP can be found at the following link:
Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what long-term plans he has to ensure that the NHS is (a) a resilient and (b) a strategic protective service in order to tackle future health emergencies.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
NHS England and NHS Improvement have a statutory requirement to formally assure their own and the National Health Service in England’s readiness to respond to emergencies on an annual basis. To do this, NHS England and NHS Improvement ask commissioners and providers of NHS-funded care to complete an Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response annual assurance process. Further information is available at the following link:
https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/eprr-annual-assurance-guidance-v2.0.pdf
NHS England also produces an Incident Response Plan (National). This is the overarching generic plan that details how NHS England reviews and responds to any health-related incident or emergency at the national level, there are plans which describe the regional response and each NHS organisation will have its own Incident Response Plan. Further information is available at the following link:
https://www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/NHS-england-incident-response-plan-v3-0.pdf
Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many contracts have been awarded to to private companies using Coronavirus Act 2020 emergency tendering powers; what the value of those contracts is; and for what (a) services and (b) products those contracts are for.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
Guidance on how contracting authorities should respond to COVID-19 was published on 18 March. Authorities are allowed to procure goods, services and works with extreme urgency in exceptional circumstances using regulation 32(2)(c) under the Public Contract Regulations 2015. We have made it clear that authorities must continue to achieve value for money for taxpayers, use good commercial judgement and publish the details of any awards made.
To date under the regulation, 636 contracts have been awarded to private sector companies worth £6.2 billion by the Department. Procurement Regulations require the publication of the individual Contract Award Notices in the Official Journal of the European which will contain information on the value, services and products provided under the contract; and we publish certain information on Contracts Finder about contracts awarded.
Asked by: Clive Lewis (Labour - Norwich South)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that sufficient personal protective equipment is available to GPs that are providing palliative care and are exposed to potential covid-19 patients in the community.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are working around the clock to give the social care sector and wider National Health Service the equipment and support they need to tackle this outbreak.
Systems set up to supply 226 NHS trusts have scaled up to provide drops of critical equipment to 58,000 healthcare settings including general practitioners (GPs), pharmacies and social care providers. We have made over 24 million items of PPE available to primary care providers