Q4, Q5, Q6, Q7
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Running commentary: “Our shifts were meant to be excruciating 12-hour marathons,” Raddi writes. “In reality, they are rather more like laid-back morning jogs. Dozens of academics and laboratory personnel from all over the U.K. languish in a hotel with nothing to do. Millions of pounds of equipment borrowed from universities and companies rests silently in the evening hours, when the noise of our collective toil should be deafening.” If the testing capacity is there, the committee will want to know why it’s not being reached.
Fight! The blame game over the ongoing testing issue revs up again in the Times. Whitehall officials blame health service delays in putting doctors and nurses forward, and hint that some are reluctant to be checked and sent back to work, the paper reports, while doctors blame a failure to make testing convenient, plus confusion about eligibility.
But but but: In the Telegraph, Institute of Biomedical Science President Allan Wilson insisted there are still not enough supplies to meet the 100,000 a day target. He said NHS lab workers were “increasingly expressing their frustration” because “they are still not able to source the testing kits and reagents they require … we are clear that it is a global supply shortage holding biomedical scientists back, not a lack of capacity.”
Ruh-roh: Justice Secretary Robert Buckland did not do Hancock any favors last night when he told BBC Question Time the German death rate has been lower because “their rate of testing has been much, much higher.” He added: “If we were testing much more widely, then we might have a different set of statistics.” Hunt will be interested to know whether the death rate is one of those statistics.
And another thing: The committee might want to ask about this New York Times scoop claiming the government spent $20 million on 2 million antibody test kits from Chinese firms … which later turned out not to work.
QUESTION 4: Are masks going to be a thing or not? Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty made it sound like a U-turn could be coming down the track very soon when he told the Downing Street press conference the debate around masks was “a very live issue.” In the Daily Mail, Political Editor Jason Groves says ministers are discussing whether the use of masks and gloves in the workplace and on public transport could be “the only way to allow a widespread return to normality once the home lockdown ends.”
Music to the ears of: London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who last night told BBC London he was “hopeful” the government would advise the use of face coverings such as scarves. Khan has written to ministers urging them to take on board global evidence suggesting face coverings can reduce transmission from asymptomatic carriers of the disease. On Newsnight last night, Shadow Health Minister Justin Madders agreed that masks “might be part of the solution.” Khan will be touring the broadcast studios to press his case this morning.
QUESTION 5: The committee will surely want to ask about the wider health impacts of the lockdown, after the ONS revealed the staggering number of excess deaths compared to past averages. Many of those deaths are not accounted for by COVID-19, and could be a result of people not getting help for other conditions. In the i newspaper, Professor Karol Sikora, a former head of the World Health Organization’s cancer program, warned that 60,000 cancer patients in the U.K. would die if the lockdown goes on for six months.
QUESTION 6: ITV’s Robert Peston tweeted last night that the new Nightingale hospitals are unable to accept patients with complex health needs on top of COVID-19, meaning many of the most serious cases have to remain in existing intensive care units. Playbook has heard the same from a source with ties to the London Nightingale: that only patients for straightforward ventilation are admitted, so the majority are staying in other hospitals. There are also rumors the hospital is struggling to get enough staff on stream.
QUESTION 7: Tugendhat, the foreign affairs committee chair, will presumably want to ask what Dominic Raab really meant at the Downing Street press conference when he said there would be “no more business as usual” with China once the coronavirus crisis is over. Bloomberg reports that government officials believe legislation allowing Chinese firm Huawei a role in the U.K. 5G network could now be at risk after Tory backbench attitudes hardened against Beijing amid the COVID-19 crisis.
Right then, Matt: Have fun! And there is plenty more to come when parliament starts getting back up to speed next week.
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