Asked by: Darren Henry (Conservative - Broxtowe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what further support he plans to make available to the health and social care workforce during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
We are maintaining high levels of support for staff, including ensuring they have access to the personal protective equipment and testing they need. Furthermore, all eligible frontline workers have now been offered the vaccine. We continue to expand the workforce, having committed to increasing the National Health Service nursing workforce by 50,000 by the end of this Parliament and promoting social care careers through a national media campaign. We have also put in place a package of mental health support for all staff.
Asked by: Darren Henry (Conservative - Broxtowe)
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 support the provision of non-covid-19 healthcare treatment during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Edward Argar
We have provided £63 billion of extra funding to the National Health Service in 2020-21 and £20.3 billion in 2021-22 to help manage ongoing COVID-19 pressures alongside non-COVID-19 activity levels. We are providing an additional £3 billion next year on top of the long-term settlement, to support recovery from COVID-19.
The Spending Review allocated £1 billion to help tackle the elective backlog and support hospitals to cut long waits for treatment by carrying up to one million extra checks, scans and additional operations or procedures. We have also provided funding for enhanced Infection Prevention and Control measures, including £450 million to expand and upgrade accident and emergency departments to reduce overcrowding and improve infection control so we can continue to treat all patients safely.
Asked by: Darren Henry (Conservative - Broxtowe)
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 there is an adequate number of NHS dentist appointments available throughout the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Jo Churchill
Dental practices closed in March 2020. Since June, a steady increase in dental activity has been made possible following updated Infection Prevention and Control guidance issued by Public Health England. Contractual arrangements for quarter four have been introduced by NHS England and NHS Improvement requiring dental practices to deliver 45% of contracted units of dental activity from 1 January to 31 March 2021 to be deemed to have delivered the full contractual volume. This is expected to increase available National Health Service dental care for patients.
The Department is working closely with NHS England and NHS Improvement and the Chief Dental Officer for England to increase levels of service, as fast as is safely possible. In circumstances where patients are unable to access an urgent dental appointment directly through an NHS dental practice, they should contact NHS 111 for assistance. Over 600 urgent dental care centres remain open to help patients access care.
Asked by: Darren Henry (Conservative - Broxtowe)
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 upgrade (a) A&E departments and (b) intensive care units prior to winter 2020-21.
Answered by Edward Argar
We have announced £450 million of funding in 2020/21 for upgrades to accident and emergency (A&E) departments at over 120 trusts and covering over 190 sites. Funding was awarded on the condition that schemes bring substantial improvements to A&Es this winter. £600 million of investment has also been delivered to address critical infrastructure risk across the National Health Service estate. The majority of this funding has been provided to acute trusts to mitigate risks to healthcare delivery and patient safety.
Asked by: Darren Henry (Conservative - Broxtowe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department has taken to use (a) universities, (b) businesses and (c) other private laboratories to increase covid-19 testing and lab capacity; and whether he has fast-tracked private medical laboratory accreditation for that purpose.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
Pillar 2 uses Lighthouse laboratories and has partnership arrangements with public, private and academic sector laboratories. The United Kingdom’s daily COVID-19 testing capacity passed the 500,000 mark on 31 October. Testing capacity in the UK across all pillars between 29 October and 4 November was at 4,367,049 tests, an increase of 21% compared to the previous week.
Asked by: Darren Henry (Conservative - Broxtowe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps the Government has taken to review the effect of the covid-19 outbreak on delivery of the Childhood Obesity Action Plan.
Answered by Jo Churchill
Through the three chapters of our childhood obesity plan we are delivering a wide range of measures to help achieve our bold ambition to halve childhood obesity by 2030 and significantly reduce the gap in obesity between children from the most and least deprived areas by 2030.
Public Health England led a rapid review to better understand how different factors can impact on how people are affected by COVID-19. This includes analysis of age, deprivation and obesity, where data was available. The review’s findings were published on 2 June and are available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-review-of-disparities-in-risks-and-outcomes
Many of the measures in the three chapters of the childhood obesity plan will have an impact on tackling obesity across all age groups. These include the soft drinks industry levy, sugar reduction and wider calorie reformulation programme, restricting promotions and calorie labelling in restaurants which will improve our eating habits and reduce the amount of sugar we consume.
We remain committed to reviewing what more can be done and will continue to monitor progress and emerging evidence.
Asked by: Darren Henry (Conservative - Broxtowe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when opticians will be able to reopen for routine appointments as part of the easing of the covid-19 lockdown.
Answered by Jo Churchill
NHS England and NHS Improvement have been in discussion with the College, over plans to restart NHS eye care services.
NHS England and NHS Improvement issued a letter and Standard Operating Procedure to the profession on 17 June setting out that practices are able to resume routine NHS eye care services, where practices have the relevant infection protection control and personal protection equipment in place. The letter also refers to guidance issued by the College of Optometrists, setting out ways in which practices could be adapted in the current circumstances. NHS England and NHS Improvement’s guidance can be found at the following link:
https://www.england.nhs.uk/coronavirus/primary-care/optical-setting/