Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what plans his Department has in place to prepare for a potential future pandemic.

The Department continues to plan and prepare for a range of pandemic and emerging infectious disease scenarios, including those caused by respiratory, contact and vector-borne pathogens. We are building on lessons learned from exercises and incidents, including the COVID-19 pandemic.

Pandemic preparedness is an area kept under constant review and our strategic approach evolves in response to new scientific information, lessons learned from prior pandemics, responses to other infectious disease outbreaks and rigorous exercising to test our response mechanisms. We have a range of plans and well tested response capabilities in place to respond to pandemics.