Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the estimated annual increase is in funding for local government for social care as a result of the introduction of the new social care tax.
Answered by Gillian Keegan - Secretary of State for Education
On 7th September we announced £5.4 billion over three years for Adult Social Care, and this investment in adult social care is being funded from the new Health and Social Care Levy. This includes over £3.6 billion to reform the social care charging system and enable all local authorities to move towards paying providers a fair rate for care, and over £1.7 billion to begin major improvements across the care system in England, including at least £500 million investment in the workforce.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the current annual total budget is for public sector contributions to residential social care covering central and local government.
Answered by Gillian Keegan - Secretary of State for Education
Budget data is not collected for the residential part of the adult social care sector. NHS Digital publishes statistics on social care expenditure, with the latest available statistics from the Adult Social Care Finance Return available at the following link.
According to these statistics the Net Current Expenditure by local authorities on long-term support in nursing and residential care was £5.7 billion in 2020-21.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many people are training to become (a) doctors and (b) nurses in the UK.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
Health Education England estimates that in the 2021/22 academic year there are over 72,000 student nurses in training in England.
In the 2019/20 academic year there were 45,605 undergraduate medical students in the United Kingdom, of which 32,745 were training in England, according to data provided to the General Medical Council (GMC) by the Higher Education Statistics Agency.
Student medics register with GMC when they begin their course, because of that there are more accurate numbers available for the numbers training to be doctors.
These figures include anyone at any point in their degree. Nursing degrees are usually three years, medical degrees four to six years.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, when he plans to publish the detailed budget plans for reducing NHS waiting lists in England.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The NHS 2022/23 Operational Planning Guidance confirms £2.3 billion has been allocated to support the recovery of elective services. This is in addition to £1.5 billion over three years via core budgets to support new surgical hubs, increased bed capacity and equipment. National Health Service systems are currently developing individual plans for elective services in 2022/23.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what proportion of beds in NHS England hospitals are currently occupied by patients admitted for treatment of covid 19.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
As of 18 January 2022, 7,605 beds in English National Health Service hospitals were occupied by patients being treated primarily for COVID-19.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what drugs are made available to NHS patients with covid-19 to treat them and help keep them out of hospital.
Answered by Maggie Throup
Since December 2021, National Health Service patients can access new COVID-19 therapies, including antivirals and monoclonal antibodies which can reduce the risk of becoming hospitalised. In England, 1.3 million of the highest risk patients are eligible for monoclonal antibody Sotrovimab and antiviral drug molnupiravir directly. Eligible patients who receive a positive polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test result will be contacted by a clinician from a COVID Medicines Delivery Unit to discuss treatment suitability. The clinician will be responsible for assessing the patient and deciding which treatment option is most appropriate for them and their existing condition/s.
In addition, over 20 million people are eligible for the antiviral molnupiravir through the new PANORAMIC national study, run by the University of Oxford. This study is open to individuals in the United Kingdom who have received a positive PCR test result, are aged 50 years old and over, or are aged 18 to 49 years old with an underlying medical condition that can increase the risk of developing severe COVID-19.
The antiviral PF-07321332+ritonavir (co-packaged and brand name Paxlovid) received approval from the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency on 31 December 2021 and will be made available to eligible patients in due course.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
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 accuracy of SAGE forecasts of likely hospital bed use for covid-19 patients during the covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) provides advice to the Government on its response to the COVID-19 epidemic. Their operational subgroup, the Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Modelling (SPI-M-O), regularly models potential scenarios for the trajectory of the epidemic, including hospital admissions and occupancy. Such modelling is regularly updated to reflect changes in assumptions as and when more detailed studies are released. This has been the case throughout the pandemic.
Much of SAGE’s modelling is of unmitigated scenarios, which assume that no interventions are made. In reality, non-pharmaceutical interventions have been implemented in order to avoid such scenarios occurring. Comparisons between modelled scenarios and real events should be made on a like-for-like basis as the assumptions and/or context changed between the modelling being performed and the outturn data. The SPI-M-O regularly reviews these scenarios against outturn data.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what proportion of NHS hospital beds were occupied by patients admitted solely to treat covid-19 at the last available count.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The data is not held in the format requested. As of 11 January 2022, 56% of beds occupied by COVID-19 patients were occupied by those admitted solely to be treated for COVID-19.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what budget has been allocated for covid-19 testing in 2021-22; and how many self-testing kits are being used each day.
Answered by Maggie Throup
In 2021/22, £15 billion was allocated for test, trace and isolate activities. Of this, approximately £11.26 billion relates to testing, including polymerase chain reaction and lateral flow device testing and associated costs. The number of self-testing kits used each day is not held centrally as some tests are likely to be unregistered.
Asked by: John Redwood (Conservative - Wokingham)
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 expand UK-based capacity to produce covid-19 testing kits.
Answered by Maggie Throup
In October 2020, the Government commissioned work to support the United Kingdom’s diagnostic industry, to secure a lateral flow antigen test and increase domestic production capacity. The UK Make programme delivered two clinically validated and regulatory approved UK lateral flow antigen tests and provided investment in capital equipment and facilities expansion at three UK manufacturing companies. Over 100 million tests were produced for deployment by the UK Health Security Agency and production capacity of lateral flow antigen test increased by 3,500%. The first UK-made self-test lateral flow device is currently due to be deployed in January 2022. The UK Make programme has also increased capacity and resilience for current and future public health challenges.