Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits where geographically expedient of using Nightingale hospitals as covid-19 centres of excellence to take all covid-19 cases and free up local acute hospitals to ensure that they remain covid-free; and will he make a statement.

The National Health Service Nightingale hospitals are an unprecedented response to an unprecedented challenge and created additional capacity to ensure the NHS can respond to demand if needed.

The Nightingale hospitals are available to support the NHS when needed. Local clinical leaders are working to determine how this is done whilst considering the needs of all patients requiring NHS care.