Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether the Government plans to make available face masks from clear material to assist people in lip reading who are deaf or hard of hearing.

The Government recognise concerns about the use of personal protective equipment (PPE), particularly face masks when it comes to people who lip read. The United Kingdom Government’s PPE procurement team has been working extremely hard to source clear facemasks which comply with UK safety standards and have signed a contract to supply stocks of clear masks into health and social care settings, to support those who need to lip read.