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 respond in a timely way to potential increases in covid-19 infection rates in the context of the time taken to collate and report data by the ONS in its releases.

The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) undertakes regular monitoring of United Kingdom and international COVID-19 data to enable the Government to respond to potential increases in infection rates. We will continue to monitor COVID-19 cases, in hospital settings in particular, including using genomic sequencing to allow insights into the evolution of the virus.

This includes estimated infection rates published on a weekly basis by the Office of National Statistics to support the Government’s decision making. Data held on the level of transmission of COVID-19 is published daily on the Coronavirus Dashboard in a weekly summary in the weekly National flu and COVID-19 surveillance reports.