Coronavirus Action Plan

Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 1:41 pm on 11 March 2020.

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Photo of Vaughan Gething Vaughan Gething Labour 1:41, 11 March 2020

On your point about remote consultations so that people don't necessarily need to attend in person, we've already had a programme of work to do exactly that through the health service. For example, many people now can have advice about eye health conditions without actually needing to go and see a consultant. We've managed to improve access by making use of our primary care contractors in doing that—pharmacy and optometry being really good examples of that.

However, coronavirus accelerates the need to do that, to avoid person-to-person contact, where possible. That explains why, yesterday, I announced that I have made a decision to actually implement a Wales-wide solution in particular in primary and community care, to allow more video consultations to take place. We've also increased and beefed up the 111 service so that it can be across the whole of Wales to deal with advice and information on coronavirus.

It'll be the same for those areas of hospital practice that need to continue. But actually, regarding the way that our hospitals will work if the coronavirus becomes more embedded and more significant, it won't so much be about the example I've given about eye care taking place where images are swapped and sent over; it'll be more and more about how we make use of our hospitals for the sickest of people and the need to displace other activity, if that is what is required. If you look at the example of Italy, the stage they're at and the severity they have, it's an entirely different scenario for the way that the healthcare system needs to work. So none of us should pretend that, if coronavirus is a more significant issue, we can still maintain business as usual.

As for the money that the Chancellor has announced, obviously I've been preparing for questions here today, but I look forward with interest to the detail of the announcements that have been made. But, equally, the point that the Minister for Finance and Trefnydd has made is that, regardless of the headline announcements today, funding is dealt with on a needs basis across the UK to deal with the reality of the impact that the coronavirus will actually have.