Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what additional support he has allocated to the dental sector to increase capacity for (a) routine patient appointments and (b) urgent care during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Jo Churchill
During the pandemic over 600 urgent treatment centres have been opened to support the delivery of urgent care. National Health Service dentists have been asked to maximise safe throughput to meet as many prioritised needs as possible, focussing first on urgent care and vulnerable groups, followed by overdue routine care. This has been underpinned by the requirement for dental providers to deliver 60% of contracted units of dental activity and 80% of units of orthodontic activity for the first six months of 2021/22 in order to receive full payment of their NHS contract value.
Guidance has also been issued by NHS England on the use of flexible commissioning to target restricted dental capacity to those patient groups that most need support.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to make PCR covid-19 testing kits more (a) affordable and (b) widely available for the purpose of international travel.
Answered by Jo Churchill
Since requirements were introduced for international travel testing, the costs have fallen significantly. We are committed to working with the travel industry and private testing providers to reduce the cost of testing. NHS Test and Trace tests are available at the market mid-point.
To increase the availability of polymerase chain reaction testing we have published a list of over 250 private test providers based on cost, turnaround times and geographic location on GOV.UK.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what role the (a) Liverpool City Region Combine Authority, (b) Merseyside Resilience Forum, (c) St Helens Council and (d) St Helens CCG play in public health policy and practice.
Answered by Jo Churchill
Liverpool City Region Combined Authority does not have any specific public health functions, but it has a range of responsibilities which it can act on and interact with people’s health including relating to transport, housing and employment. Local resilience fora bring together multi-agency partnerships from local public services including the emergency services and the National Health Service to plan and prepare for localised incidents and emergencies. Upper tier local authorities, including St Helens Council, have a statutory duty to take steps to improve the health of their population and also play a vital role in protecting health locally. Clinical commissioning groups commission most of the hospital and community NHS services in the local area for which they are responsible.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking in conjunction with NHS Hospital Trusts to ensure that young people are able to safely have a companion present for key cancer appointments and treatments during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Jo Churchill
We understand the need for young people to be accompanied by their parents and caregivers at appointments and recommend that patients be accompanied where appropriate and necessary. The current guidance, published on 13 October 2020, allows visiting in outpatient and diagnostic settings in a COVID-19 secure way.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
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 effectiveness of mass covid-19 testing in Liverpool; and if he will publish the data that supports that assessment.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
The Government published the ‘Liverpool COVID-19 community testing pilot: interim evaluation report summary’ which is available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/liverpool-covid-19-community-testing-pilot-interim-evaluation-report-summary/liverpool-covid-19-community-testing-pilot-interim-evaluation-report-summary
The report evaluates the data on the biological, behavioural and systems aspects of the pilot and its early public health impacts. A final assessment and a more detailed report on the effectiveness of mass testing and the data to support will follow later in 2021.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what additional financial support he is providing to the NHS to tackle the adverse effects of the covid-19 outbreak on the (a) detection and (b) treatment of heart and circulatory conditions.
Answered by Jo Churchill
The recently announced Spending Review included funding of £1 billion for all health conditions to address backlogs, tackle long waiting lists and facilitating up to one million extra checks, scans and additional operations.
The NHS Long Term Plan also includes work to raise awareness of the symptoms of heart failure and to ensure early and rapid access to diagnostic tests and treatment. This remains a priority for NHS England and NHS Improvement during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate he has made of the time period required to clear the backlog of cases of (a) heart surgery and (b) other procedures delated or postponed during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Edward Argar
NHS England has advised it is too early to make an estimate of the time required to clear the backlog of cases.
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many heart (a) operations and (b) procedures were performed in each year since 2010 across the St Helens Clinical Commissioning Group area.
Answered by Jo Churchill
The number of heart operations and procedures recorded for patients in the St Helens Clinical Commissioning Group for in each year from 2010-11 to 2019-20 is shown in the following table:
Year | Operations | Procedures |
2010-11 | 1,125 | 1,476 |
2011-12 | 1,153 | 1,657 |
2012-13 | 1,153 | 1,593 |
2013-14 | 1,060 | 1,480 |
2014-15 | 1,107 | 1,532 |
2015-16 | 1,185 | 1,612 |
2016-17 | 1,503 | 1,982 |
2017-18 | 1,290 | 1,747 |
2018-19 | 1,199 | 1,646 |
2019-20 | 1,207 | 1,592 |
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
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 public health guidance underpinning the decision to close (a) leisure centres and gyms, (b) casinos and betting shops and (c) pubs and bars in the Liverpool City Region in response to the imposition of the tier 3 local covid alert level.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) provides advice to the Department and considered the risks of transmission through different routes and environments, including leisure centres, gyms, casinos and betting shops. SAGE’s paper is available at the following link:
A national impact assessment on the potential effect of COVID-19 restrictions on transmission across the country, including in the Liverpool City region, is available at the following link:
The Government also published scientific evidence regarding transmission risk in the hospitality sector, particularly pubs and bars, which is available at the following link:
Asked by: Conor McGinn (Independent - St Helens North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what role the (a) Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, (b) Merseyside Resilience Forum and (c) individual local authorities play in determining the (i) local covid-19 alert tiering arrangements and (ii) implementation of those arrangements.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
We worked with all appropriate local leaders and representative groups to agree the right decision for the area based on the best available science, along with the consideration of the economic, operational, social and policy implications.