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 effect of the covid-19 outbreak on the number of patients receiving elective NHS treatment in (a) Wirral and (b) England.

The number of patients who completed Referral-To-Treatment pathways between March and June 2020 was down 44% in England on the same period last year. For patients seen at Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, Wirral Community NHS Foundation Trust and The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre NHS Foundation Trust, the effect was slightly larger, with a drop of 46% for the period March to June 2020 compared with the same period last year.

On 31 July further guidance was issued to local National Health Service providers and commissioners on outlining the next phase of the NHS response to COVID-19 and concurrent non-COVID-19 activity. The focus is on accelerating the return of non-COVID-19 health services to near-normal levels, including making full use of available capacity between now and winter, whilst also preparing for winter demand pressures. This will be done alongside continued vigilance in light of any further COVID-19 spikes locally and possibly nationally.