Covid-19

Statement

The following Statement was made in the House of Commons on Monday 19 October.

“I would like to make a statement on coronavirus. As winter draws in, the virus is on the offensive: 40 million coronavirus cases have now been recorded worldwide. Weekly deaths in Europe have increased by 33%, and here in the UK deaths have tragically doubled in the last 12 days. The situation remains perilous.

While the disease is dangerous for all adults, especially with growing evidence of the debilitating consequences of long Covid, we know it is especially dangerous for older people. Cases continue to rise among the over-60s, who are most likely to end up in hospital or worse. I am very worried that the cases per 100,000 among the over 60s is 401 in the Liverpool city region, 241 in Lancashire and, in Greater Manchester, has risen over the past week from 171 to 283. That is why the Government have been working so hard to act, and I am very glad that we have been able to agree, across party lines, the necessary measures in Liverpool and Lancashire, and we are working hard to reach such an agreement in Greater Manchester.

We are doing everything in our power to suppress the virus, support the economy, support education and support the NHS until a vaccine is available. That is the right strategy, charting a path that allows for the greatest economic and social freedom while protecting life. The director general of the World Health Organisation said last week:

‘Allowing a dangerous virus that we don’t fully understand to run free is simply unethical.’

I agree. I know that this is difficult and I know that it is relentless, but we must have resolve, see this through and never stop striving to support the science that will one day make us safe.

I was at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital this morning meeting NHS colleagues who are caring for patients with such dedication, as they always do. I heard from them how important it is for everyone to support the NHS by keeping the virus down so that the NHS is not overwhelmed by Covid patients and it can deliver all the essential non-Covid care that people need. I am glad to report that the number of people experiencing a long wait for cancer treatment has been brought down by 63% since its peak in July. I want to thank all the cancer teams who are working so hard to ensure people get the cancer screening, diagnostics and treatment that they need, even in these difficult circumstances, but the best way to protect cancer treatment and all the other treatments in the NHS is to keep the prevalence of coronavirus down.

In doing this, of course, we are taking as localised and targeted a way as possible. Our local code alert level system means that we can have different rules in places such as Cornwall, where transmission is low, and Liverpool, where transmission is high and rising. On Thursday, I updated the House about several areas of the country that we are moving into the high alert level and today I would like to inform the House at the earliest possible opportunity that Lancashire has now moved into the very high alert level. Infection rates in Lancashire are among the highest in the country and are continuing to rise rapidly, including in the over-60s as I mentioned. Both the number of cases and the number of hospital admissions are doubling almost every fortnight, and the number of Covid patients in intensive care beds in Lancashire has already reached nearly half the number seen at the height of the pandemic earlier this year. So we knew we had to take rapid action to suppress the epidemic in Lancashire.

We have always said that we stand side by side with any local area that agreed to move into this third tier and offer substantial support to local authorities, including for testing, tracing, enforcement and business support. I would like to thank local leaders in Lancashire who have been working with us so constructively, and I am sure that their willingness to put politics aside in the national interest, and in the interests of the people whom we serve, will save lives and protect livelihoods at this difficult time.

Following the successful introduction of measures in Liverpool and Lancashire, talks continue this afternoon with Greater Manchester, led by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government. This week, further discussions are planned with South Yorkshire, West Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, the north-east and Teesside.

Sadly, over the weekend, we have seen very directly the impact of this disease. I was shocked to learn on Saturday of the sad death from coronavirus of Bill Anderson, the brother of Liverpool Mayor Joe Anderson. My heart and, I am sure, the sympathies of the whole House go out to the Anderson family and the people of Liverpool, who have lost a brother. All our thoughts are with our colleague, the hon. Member for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), who is in hospital with pneumonia after testing positive for Covid-19. We wish her a speedy recovery and send all our support to the NHS in Greater Manchester, which is caring for her and so many others.

I would also like to provide an update on testing—another vital line of defence. We are testing more people than any other country in Europe. We are now doing over 300,000 tests a day, up from 2,000 a day in February, and we have opened over 500 test sites, including new walk-in centres in Dundee on Friday, in Edinburgh on Saturday and in Newcastle this morning.

Alongside that important work, we are working hard to discover and evaluate new testing technologies that are simpler, faster and cheaper. Some of these tests can produce a result as quickly as in 15 minutes, and we will make them available to local directors of public health as part of our strategy for local action, starting with areas in the very high alert level. We are rolling them out across hospitals and care homes, to test patients and residents yet more regularly and keep people safe, and for schools and universities, so that we can keep education open safely through the winter. These tests have shown real promise, and we are both buying them now and ramping up our ability to produce them at scale here in the UK. We will stop at nothing to support this extraordinary scientific and logistical endeavour, which can give us hope on the path back to normal life.

Finally, I would like to inform the House that on Friday, we laid regulations to support the roll-out of both the flu vaccination and any Covid vaccination. While, of course, no vaccine technology is certain, we must be prepared to deploy a vaccine as soon as one is safely available. The new regulations provide for a wider range of clinically qualified people to administer vaccines and for the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency to grant a UK licence for a vaccine before the end of the transition period, should that be necessary. We wish all our scientists well in this vital work, and we will give them all the support they need.

We are once again at a decisive moment in our fight against coronavirus. While our scientists work round the clock on the solutions that will finally bring this crisis to an end, we must all play our part, come together and work together to keep people safe, suppress the virus and save both livelihoods and lives. I commend this statement to the House.”

My Lords, first, I declare my interests in the register.

I thank the Minister for taking both these Statements, because we are in fact updating ourselves on Thursday’s and Monday’s Statements. Without doubt, the virus continues to grow. The R rate is now between 1.3 and 1.5, unless it has increased in the past 24 hours. We on these Benches welcome the advances in saliva and LAMP testing, of course. Indeed, I join everyone in being in awe of the work being carried out in our universities.

I will briefly describe the real-life experience of Test and Trace that happened to a neighbour of mine and her family in the past few weeks. After the first member of the family tested positive, they were given one ID and told to isolate for 14 days as a contact of that family member. The remaining members of the family tested positive four days later. They were given a second ID as a positive contact and told to isolate for 10 days. They all then gave each other’s names to Test and Trace as contacts—of course they did; they live in the same house—and were given a third ID. They were then rung up and told to isolate for another 14 days. When they put their test results into the app, they were given a fourth length of time to isolate, which did not match up with what they had been told on the phone. The various Test and Trace staff did not seem able to collate the information that they were being given or to join it up—although some of them tried, it must be said.

It is not surprising, then, that a significant number of people are not complying with self-isolation advice. They may not even understand it. This family, all of whom were being contacted several times a day by phone and text, felt that they were caught in a Kafkaesque world where they were given different advice daily. One said that when the Test and Trace adviser rang her to say that she could go out on Saturday morning, she was afraid to leave the house until the day after because that was what the app told her.

Next week is half term. If one looks at the graphs, the south-west looks to be a good destination for the week. I live in Cornwall and tourism is vital to our economy, which was already blighted in the earlier holiday seasons this year. We need visitors and we are ready. What guidance would the Minister give those visitors about the need for social distancing and the wearing of masks? In the summer, there was a reluctance in some cases to comply; many just said that they were on holiday.