Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
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 tackle (a) age and (b) socio-economic inequalities in alcohol treatment service provision.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Local authorities are responsible for assessing local needs and commissioning services to meet these needs, including substance misuse treatment services for people with alcohol dependence.
Public Health England supports local authorities in this work by providing data, guidance and advice. This includes the Local Alcohol Profiles for England (LAPE) which provide local data alongside national comparisons to support local health improvement and an intelligence-driven approach to understanding and meeting local need. Inequalities data is included wherever possible to allow local government, health organisations, commissioners and other agencies to assess the extent of variation in alcohol-related harm. The LAPE is available at the following link:
https://fingertips.phe.org.uk/profile/local-alcohol-profiles
Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
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 implications for his policies of the recommendations for service provision presented in the qualitative study on addressing the needs of older adults receiving alcohol treatment during the covid-19 pandemic, published by the Drink Wise, Age Well programme in November 2020.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department will consider the recommendations made in the study.
Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the accessibility of covid-19 vaccination centres for people who suffer from sight loss, including information sent to patients in a format they can understand; and what steps his Department took to ensure accessibility for people with sight loss when selecting venues for vaccination clinics.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The Department is working to ensure that simple accessible advice and information is available to everyone who needs it. All material will be available in a range of formats, including translations, easy read, braille and is accessible for those with hearing impairment.
Vaccine deployment will take account of disabled people in various care settings, as accessibility is part of the assurance process for all delivery models for the COVID-19 vaccine. All vaccination venues will be accessible and will meet the needs of people with disabilities.
Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
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 10 December 2020 to Question 125991 on Hearing Impairment: Protective Clothing, whether his Department plans to extend the pilot of clear face coverings to educational settings.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The ClearMask pilot is now complete. Based on the feedback provided, we will be running an assessment of a broader array of products from a range of manufacturers. This assessment will test different types of transparent masks currently at prototype stage against a new technical specification being developed by the regulatory bodies. We are engaging users, so they may assess the appropriateness of different masks for each end-user setting, including those in education.
Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether the covid-19 lockdown restrictions announced in January 2021 permit travel from a person's main property to a second home or caravan, within a similar locality, where their home or caravan is suitably distanced from other caravans and they would not require contact with anyone outside of their household while they were there.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
Our guidance states that people cannot leave their home or the place where they are living for holidays or overnight stays without a reasonable excuse for doing so. Holidays in the United Kingdom and abroad are not permitted. This includes staying in a second home or caravan, if that is not the primary residence.
Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department plans to introduce an exemption to the existing covid-19 regulations to clarify what (a) contact and (b) travel is permitted between a non-cohabiting couple in England, in circumstances where the couple (i) cannot live together and (ii) live in households with other people.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
If a non-cohabiting couple fulfil the eligibility criteria for a support bubble, they have the choice to form a bubble and can then travel and have contact with each other during this national lockdown. If both partners live with other people, they will not be able to form a support bubble. This is because the formation of a support bubble and therefore the ability to have close contact with those they do not live with, carries transmission risks. As such the eligibility criteria is necessarily limited to smaller households most at risk of isolation.
The Government keeps the social contact restrictions under continual review and will make changes as and when the data and science supports it.
Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Covid-19 priority vaccination list published on 2 December 2020, whether people classed as frontline health and social care workers includes those currently studying who are working on the frontline during educational placements.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The Green Book chapter on COVID-19 states that all staff who have frequent face-to-face clinical contact with patients and who are directly involved in patient care, in either secondary or primary care/community settings, are eligible to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. This includes temporary staff, such as those working in the COVID-19 vaccination programme, students, trainees and volunteers who are working with patients.
Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether (a) parents and (b) carers of clinically vulnerable children will be prioritised for the covid-19 vaccine.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) consists of independent experts who advise the Government on which vaccine(s) the United Kingdom should use and provide advice on prioritisation at a population level. The JCVI has advised that the first priorities for any COVID-19 vaccination programme should be the prevention of COVID-19 mortality and the protection of health and social care staff and systems.
Therefore, in line with the recommendations of the JCVI, the vaccine will be initially rolled out to these priority groups, including care home residents and staff, people over 80 years old, and health and care workers. The vaccine will then be prioritised amoungst the rest of the population in order of age and risk, including those who are clinically extremely vulnerable, and all individuals aged 16-64 years old with underlying health conditions.
As the first phase of the programme is rolled out in the UK, additional data will become available on the safety and effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines. This data will provide the basis for consideration of vaccination in groups that are at lower risk of mortality from COVID-19.
Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will publish the methodology that was used to determine which tier of covid-19 restrictions apply to each region of England.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
Decisions on tiers are made by Ministers based on public health recommendations informed by the case detection rate in all age groups and in particular, among those over 60 years olds; how quickly case rates are rising or falling; positivity in the general population; pressure on the National Health Service; and local context and exceptional circumstances such as a local but contained outbreaks.
As decisions are informed by a range of factors, it is possible for variation between individual factors when comparing areas.
Asked by: Ian Mearns (Labour - Gateshead)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he plans to (a) provide transparent face coverings to front line service workers and (b) encourage workers required to wear a face covering, to wear something transparent, to help people who are deaf or rely on lip reading to communicate.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Government is guided by the scientific evidence emerging in this area. Separately, clear face masks are being piloted in some health and social care settings and the lessons will be taken on board for future policy.
If workers are speaking to or providing assistance to someone who relies on lip reading, clear sound or facial expressions to communicate, they have a reasonable excuse to not wear a face covering. Employers must undertake risk assessments to ensure their business addresses the risks of COVID-19, using Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy guidance to inform decisions and control measures including social distancing rules and screens, which is available on GOV.UK.