Questions Without Notice from Party Spokespeople

Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 1:46 pm on 11 March 2020.

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Photo of Rhun ap Iorwerth Rhun ap Iorwerth Plaid Cymru 1:46, 11 March 2020

Diolch, Dirprwy Lywydd. Some questions initially on preparations for an increased intensity of outbreak, and it's important to put those preparations in place. We know from international experience that critical care capacity could become very, very important here. I've been looking at some figures today that show that critical care beds per 100,000 people in the UK is low, compared with global standards, and in Wales it is certainly much lower than in England. Both I and Adam Price asked yesterday what has been done to ensure that we are increasing capacity. I'm not sure that we had the answers that we wanted yesterday, so I'll ask again: what is being done now to make sure that capacity is being increased as much as possible, because current capacity is not going to be enough? I accept that there may be a different nature to the kind of capacity that we will need compared with normal times, but I think it's very important that we have a description from Government of what exactly is being done to make sure that we increase capacity in this very, very important area.