Dear Colleague
COVID-19
Further to my statement in the House on Tuesday I’m writing today to give you the latest information on the COVID-19 outbreak.
Latest
Yesterday a patient in England who tested positive for COVID-19 sadly died. The patient, who was being treated at the Royal Berkshire Hospital, was older and had underlying health conditions. We believe the patient contracted the virus in the UK and contact tracing is already underway.
We currently have 115 cases diagnosed in the UK – 105 in England, 6 in Scotland, 1 in Wales and 3 in Northern Ireland. Most of the cases, particularly the most recent ones, have been from people who have travelled to northern Italy or been in contact with people who have travelled there.
Public Health England (PHE) have undertaken 18,083 tests of which 17,966 have tested negative.
As the CMO said at the Health Select Committee on 5th March, the upper end of the mortality rate overall, in terms of people infected, is 1%. It may well be lower than that, because there may well be a lot of people who are infected and have no symptoms whom we cannot currently identify.
Parliamentary hotline
I appreciate you are no doubt receiving a number of questions from concerned constituents. I have asked Public Health England to establish a helpline for MPs and Members of the House of Lords for enquiries regarding the novel Coronavirus COVID-19 situation. The helpline is intended to provide MPs and Peers with access to Public Health clinicians who can help you better understand the public health response to COVID-19 and give you confidence that their concerns are being treated with the utmost seriousness.
The helpline is for MPs and Peers only and it is important that the number is restricted to these groups in order that we are able to continue to provide this access. We are not staffing this to the level of a commercial call centre operation as this is not possible or appropriate within the resources available.
Please do not refer constituents, other members of the public or media to this number. The helpline will be able to answer queries with regards to the public health response to COVID-19 but we will not be able to discuss individual cases or patient information. PHE will offer guidance to all MPs and Peers, regardless of which part of the UK they are from, and will suggest to MPs and Peers from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland to check with their respective public health organisation to ensure consistency.
The helpline telephone number is 0300 303 0299 (between 8am and 8pm Monday – Friday)
The helpline email address is [email protected]
Ongoing work
We are working hard to contain the virus and the NHS is well prepared, but we must be prepared for this to get worse before it gets better. We have been clear from the outset that we expect coronavirus to have some impact on the UK and a global pandemic could have a pronounced effect on the NHS, which is why we are planning for all eventualities.
It is vital that we continue to make decisions based on the best scientific advice available.
The Chief Medical Officer has stated at the Health Select Committee today that it is highly likely that there is some level of community transmission of the virus in the UK and the government is working on the assumption that the virus is here at very low levels.
This means the response is moving from the mainly “contain” phase into the second “delay” phase. We will continue to do everything possible to contain the spread of the virus for the time being, as this is part of delaying spread. However, other measures which could help delay the spread in parts of the country may start to be recommended in the coming weeks.
Read the latest information about the situation in the UK, along with guidance for what to do if you think you’re at risk, at www.gov.uk/coronavirus.
Public information campaign
It is important to remember everyone has their part to play. On 4th March we launched our refreshed public information campaign. You can find more about it here https://www.gov.uk/government/news/public-information-campaign-focuses-on-handwashing.
The campaign makes clear that the best way to protect yourself from infections like coronavirus is to wash your hands frequently with soap and water or use a sanitiser gel, as well as always carrying tissues and using them to catch coughs and sneezes, then putting the tissue in a bin.
Notifiable Disease
We want to ensure any steps taken to protect the public during the COVID-19 outbreak are proportionate and do not come at an unnecessary social or economic cost. At 6.15pm on 5th March, a statutory instrument was made into law that adds COVID-19 to the list of notifiable diseases and SARS-COV-2 to the list of notifiable causative agents in England. This change in law requires GPs to report all cases of COVID-19 to Public Health England.
Yours ever,
MATT HANCOCK
