Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the effect of the covid-19 outbreak on the delivery of perinatal services; and what precautionary and remedial steps his Department has taken to help reduce the (a) practical difficulties arising from the disruption caused by the covid-19 outbreak and (b) mental health consequences of that disruption for users of perinatal services.

Throughout the pandemic, NHS England and NHS Improvement have been guiding maternity services to prioritise maintaining safe and personalised maternity care by making adjustments to service provision only where necessitated by the local impact of COVID-19.

Wherever possible, services have been asked to reinstate a fully personalised approach to meeting the needs of individual women and their families across the maternity pathway.

Talking therapies are being made available remotely so people can access help safely from home and the National Health Service is working to ensure the option of face to face support is provided to people with serious mental health illnesses across all ages where it is clinically safe to do so.