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 effect of staff vacancies in the NHS on patient mortality rates.

We have not made a formal assessment. Safe staffing levels remain the responsibility of local clinical and other leaders, supported by national guidance and regulated by the Care Quality Commission.

Monthly workforce statistics for October 2021 show over 1.2 million full time equivalent staff. Since October 2020, there are 4,800 more doctors, over 10,900 more nurses and over 44,700 more National Health Service Health and Community Hospital Services staff in total. We are on schedule to deliver 50,000 more nurses by the end of this Parliament and we have also funded an additional 1,500 undergraduate medical school places each year for domestic students in England.