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 importance of offering elective orthopaedic surgery close to where people live in respect of the Government's response to the covid-19 outbreak.

Any changes to NHS services in response to the COVID-19 pandemic should be based on clinically-led decisions at the local level.

The National Health Service is working to separate COVID-19 and non- COVID-19 services, to minimise the risk of transmission.