Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps have been taken to ensure that specialists regularly update the Shielded Patient List in respect of clinically extremely vulnerable people during the covid-19 outbreak for people with inflammatory bowel disease.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Inflammatory bowel disease is not a condition that automatically identifies someone as clinically extremely vulnerable. However, there may be individuals with inflammatory bowel disease who are classed as clinically extremely vulnerable because of other clinical conditions, or as a result of the findings of the QCOVID predictive risk model.
Guidance on how clinicians can update the Shielded Patient List is regularly issued to the National Health Service and is available at the following link:
https://digital.nhs.uk/coronavirus/shielded-patient-list
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
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 adequacy of the (a) support available to and (b) capacity of the breast imaging and diagnostic workforce.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
Health Education England (HEE) welcomes Professor Sir Mike Richards’ report ‘Diagnostics Recovery and Renewal’, which stated that major expansion and reform of the diagnostic services is needed over the next five years to facilitate recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and to meet rising demand across multiple aspects of diagnostics.
HEE is working with system partners on the longer-term strategy that will also consider further the diagnostic and breast imaging workforce needs beyond 2021. This planning is fully aligned with the NHS Long Term Plan, the NHS People Plan and associated ambitions for further development of cancer services. This will include exploring sustainable growth beyond 2021 in key professions through continued investment in training places, with a greater focus on attracting and retaining students and improving the numbers of qualified professionals who go on to work in the National Health Service.
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the rate of infection with covid-19 is for (a) young people aged 11-17 and (b) adults over 18 years old in the UK.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We do not have the rate of infection (R) of COVID-19 for different age groups. The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies publishes the R number for the United Kingdom on a weekly basis.
R is not usually a useful measure on its own and needs to be considered alongside the number of new cases. More information can be found at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-r-number-in-the-uk
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the rate of infection with covid-19 is for (a) children aged 0-10 and (b) adults over 18 years old in the UK.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We do not have the rate of infection (R) of COVID-19 for different age groups. The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies publishes the R number for the United Kingdom on a weekly basis.
R is not usually a useful measure on its own and needs to be considered alongside the number of new cases. More information can be found at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/guidance/the-r-number-in-the-uk
Asked by: Andrew Bridgen (Independent - North West Leicestershire)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment Public Health England has made of the implications for its policies of recent research that cigarette smokers are less likely to contract covid-19; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
Public Health England (PHE) is monitoring the developing evidence on smoking and COVID-19 to inform its advice to the public and local and national healthcare systems.
At the request of PHE, an independent rapid review of the evidence on smoking and COVID-19 by researchers from University College London and the Royal Veterinary College will be updated regularly as a living review. The most recent report is available at the following link:
https://www.qeios.com/read/UJR2AW.2
PHE advice remains that smokers should quit; there is no evidence to justify changing that advice.