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 appropriateness of the current guidance on prioritisation of people with learning difficulties for covid-19 vaccines; and if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of expanding priority group six to include all people with learning disabilities.

On 24 February 2021, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) published a clarification of their advice on vaccinating people with a learning disability. They confirmed their view that priority should be given to those with a severe and profound learning disability, but recognised concerns about coding of learning disability on general practitioner (GP) systems and supported a practical approach of inviting everyone who is on the GP Learning Disability Register for vaccination in cohort six.

The JCVI also recognised that some people with a learning disability would not be coded at all on GP systems, and supported the planned approach to work with local authorities to identify those in residential and nursing care and those who required support - for example as part of assisted living in the community - and those in shared accommodation with multiple occupancy, to ensure this population could be offered vaccination.