Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
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 efficacy of ivermectin as a (a) prophylactic and (b) treatment for covid-19.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department continues to monitor evidence on the use of ivermectin both as a prophylactic and treatment for COVID-19. A recent collection of small studies shows some positive indications that ivermectin may act as a treatment for COVID-19. However, further high quality, larger-scale studies are still needed to confirm the safety and efficacy of this treatment. The Therapeutics Taskforce will keep the position on ivermectin under review as more data becomes available.
Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what account his Department is taking of the prevalence of false positive results when assessing the efficacy of covid-19 vaccines.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
Public Health England (PHE) is considering the impact of false positives on vaccine efficacy estimates, as part of its vaccine monitoring work. Several vaccine effectiveness studies, including PHE’s, use both repeat virology swabs and antibody testing to help exclude false positives.
Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
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 rate of positive swab tests for covid-19 among people who have received both doses of a vaccination.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
Data on effectiveness of two doses of COVID-19 vaccine will be published in due course, once larger numbers of the population have been vaccinated with two doses and sufficient time has elapsed for an effect to be monitored.
Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
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 2 September 2020 to Question 75983, on Coronavirus: Shops, if he will publish (a) the studies and (b) other research reports that his Department holds on the presence of viable covid-19 virus in the air in (i) supermarkets, (ii) other large retail settings and (iii) other non-clinical settings.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The National Institute for Health Research and UK Research and Innovation jointly awarded over £5.3million for a programme of research of eight projects to understand the routes of transmission of COVID-19 in different environments and groups of people. These projects are 12-15 months in duration and are expected to report findings in the summer of 2021.
Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
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 its policies of the Oxford University study on the efficacy of inhaled Budesonide in preventing the development of severe covid-19 symptoms; and to what extent the use of inhaled steroids could be effective in treating all variants of covid-19.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
We are aware of the STOIC study on the efficacy of inhaled Budesonide. STOIC is a Phase II trial with 146 participants. Phase II trials can indicate whether a treatment has potential to benefit patients, and positive results are normally followed by larger scale Phase III trials.
The Phase III PRINCIPLE trial, which currently has over 4,200 patients enrolled to date, is also trialling inhaled budesonide as a trial arm, the results for which are imminent. This will help us to assess whether this drug provides an effective way of treating COVID-19 in community settings.
Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, if his Department will take steps to assist British citizens living overseas to access vaccination for covid-19.
Answered by Nigel Adams
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office is closely following other countries' plans to roll out vaccines. We are keeping British Nationals updated on what healthcare options are available to them and how they can receive a vaccine locally through Travel Advice pages and 'Living In' guides on gov.uk. In addition, the UK is playing a leading international role to ensure global access to vaccines, including by contributing the equivalent of £330m a year, totalling £1.65bn, for the next five years to Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance that provides equitable access to safe and effective vaccines for 190 economies.
Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
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 efficacy of ivermectin as a (a) prophylactic and (b) treatment for covid-19.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Therapeutics Taskforce is continuing to monitor any new, high quality evidence on COVID-19 therapeutics and has been following recent findings on ivermectin.
The Department has monitored a collection of small studies which have now completed and provided some positive signals on the use of ivermectin as a treatment for COVID-19. However, larger scale studies are still needed to confirm the effectiveness and safety of this treatment. The Therapeutics Taskforce is aware that several more studies into ivermectin are set to conclude in the next few months and will continue to monitor these ongoing trials to assess the evidence available on whether ivermectin can prevent and/or reduce the severity of COVID-19.
Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department the effect of far-field aerosol transmission of covid-19 in venues that have ventilation levels of 10 litres of fresh air per person per second.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department has undertaken no specific assessment.
The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies considered the paper ‘Role of ventilation in controlling SARS-CoV-2 transmission’ at meeting 60 on 30 September.The paper is published online at the following link:
Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
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 level of fresh air per person per second required to limit the transmission of covid-19.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Department has undertaken no specific assessment.
The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies considered the paper ‘Role of ventilation in controlling SARS-CoV-2 transmission’ at meeting 60 on 30 September.The paper is published online at the following link:
Asked by: Graham Brady (Conservative - Altrincham and Sale West)
Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:
To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, whether his Department plans to update the guidance on ventilation for businesses in the hospitality sector in the context of the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Mims Davies - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
HSE recently updated web guidance on Ventilation and air conditioning during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic which is aimed at most businesses, including the hospitality sector.
The guidance provides businesses with simple ways to identify areas in a workplace that may be poorly ventilated and measures they can take to improve ventilation in those areas. It also addresses the issue of balancing good ventilation with thermal comfort (keeping a comfortable workplace temperature).