Vaughan Gething: Thank you for the recognition of the significant pace and scale of improvement over the last few weeks in the programme. There is always more to do, but I think everyone can take a share of pride in what we're doing across the country. On your point about the future infection rates, full protection isn't provided until some weeks after the first jab has been provided, and then the second dose...
Vaughan Gething: We're doing a number of things on this. It's not just about the publication of the data we have; it is about that deliberate outreach into communities that every health board is doing. They've appointed people to undertake those outreach roles. It's also about the engagement that we need to continue to have in a variety of ways. The meeting that I am having tonight is only one part of it. The...
Vaughan Gething: There is always room for improvement, and I look forward to the coming weeks and months. There is certainly no complacency from our fantastic vaccination teams across the country in terms of what we're doing and what we think that we're going to be able to do, and need to do, in the weeks and months ahead. On the appointments system, we are already looking at other potential uses of staff and...
Vaughan Gething: Thank you for the series of questions. I'll start with your first point and your last point together on vaccine supply. It is a UK Government responsibility, and the contracts that they've procured on behalf of the whole of the UK have allowed us to go out and deliver, and it's a credit to the way that our teams in Wales have then used that supply over the last weeks. I think from within your...
Vaughan Gething: Apologies, Deputy Presiding Officer. I'm just getting my statement up. Here we are. I hadn't remembered all of it just yet. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. Today we have published the third of our reports summarising progress against our national COVID-19 vaccination strategy. These reports are published every Tuesday, in addition to the surveillance data that is published by Public...
Vaughan Gething: Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I want to thank the Welsh Conservatives for bringing this important issue to the Chamber today and to all Members who have contributed. I've listened carefully to what speakers had to say. I won't be able to answer all the questions, but I'll come to those at the end. And I should say at the outset that, overall, I'm supportive of the motion and the...
Vaughan Gething: Thank you for the constructive comments once again from the legislation and justice committee, and I hope that Members will now support the regulations before us.
Vaughan Gething: Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I move the motion before us. There's only set of amending regulations to be considered today—the Health Protection (Coronavirus, International Travel and Restrictions) (Amendment) (No. 3) (Wales) Regulations 2021. Members will be aware that, in response to the emergence of several variances of COVID-19, we have temporarily suspended all travel corridors....
Vaughan Gething: In terms of your final point, I was trying to make this point in response to David Melding, and I think Vikki Howells as well, that we are deliberately looking at how we use the maternity network to share learning. This isn't just a learning opportunity for one health board; it's a learning opportunity for the whole service, and to consider and to think about how we make sure that we do...
Vaughan Gething: I don't disagree with what the Member has said at all. I think there definitely are points here about patient involvement in the design and delivery of services that make for better services in terms of their safety, but in terms of the experience and outcomes for people. I think that's absolutely true. And in terms of informed consent, I did have in my mind the issues around Cumberlege,...
Vaughan Gething: On your point about leadership, there is new leadership at the health board at executive level, and there's a new chief exec, there's a new nurse director. In fact, the nurse director arrived shortly after the independent review had reported. So, there are clean hands at executive level, which I think is really important in building staff competence, but also at clinical director level,...
Vaughan Gething: On the final point about the board's improvement programme, you'll see it transparently in both the quarterly reviews we publish and the responses from the board. This is a continuing high-profile area for the board and its governance, and the assurance that it is seeking. Again, as I said earlier, the health board knows that there is a high level of interest in what it is doing and the steps...
Vaughan Gething: Thank you for the comments and questions. I think that, in terms of understanding what 'different outcome' would mean, that will always depend on the harm that was done, and you'd need to go through individual cases to come past that. But we do know that there were poor outcomes for mothers and/or their babies, and some of the modifiable factors could have meant that people did not need to go...
Vaughan Gething: Thank you for the comments and questions. I should just point out that in 27 of the 28 cases reviewed there were modifiable factors. It's in 19 of the 28 that there were major factors that could be reasonably expected to have led to a different outcome. That's important, I think, because it does show that, in 19 of the 28, there could have been a difference. In the others, those challenges,...
Vaughan Gething: Thank you, Llywydd. Last week, I published the first of three thematic reports setting out the emerging learning from the clinical review programme established by the independent maternity services oversight panel that I appointed. The programme is currently focused on reviewing around 160 episodes of care provided by the maternity and neonatal services of the former Cwm Taf University Health...
Vaughan Gething: Yes, I think this is part of our challenge in managing people's expectations and in making sure, at the same time, that no-one gets left behind, because what we don't want is people generally ringing because they're concerned, and many people will be concerned in groups 1 to 4 at present, but then when we extend that, in groups 1 to 9, because I don't want primary care colleagues, especially...
Vaughan Gething: I thank the Member for that question. On the issue of transport workers in particular, the recent ONS publication confirmed what we knew from the first wave, that transport workers, their occupation does mean they're more at risk compared to the wider population and there's a material difference. So, that's part of what the JCVI have been looking at when they're thinking about prioritisation...
Vaughan Gething: Thank you. In terms of this, I refer back to what I said earlier about it was a good thing we had parliamentarians—none of whom were Welsh MPs, but parliamentarians from the Conservative Party and UK Labour, who are absolutely not on the same page on the great majority of issues—all agreeing to do a promotional message that encourages people to take up the vaccine. People recounting their...
Vaughan Gething: Thank you. On the second dose, without affecting the wider roll-out, we're already planning for the delivery of second doses, which—. In, literally, the coming few weeks we'll start to see more people getting their second dose, and those numbers will increase, because, as you'll know, in the first three to four weeks, we had lower numbers of people being vaccinated compared to what we're...
Vaughan Gething: If I deal with the last question first, because I think, actually, if people go to a testing centre with a range of symptoms that aren't classical, but they can explain how they feel, then most people are not going to be turned away. That isn't going to be the experience. And, actually, our bigger problem is that there are people who have symptoms but don't get a test. If you look at the...
