Questions Without Notice from Party Spokespeople

Part of 4. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 2:22 pm on 8 July 2020.

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Photo of Vaughan Gething Vaughan Gething Labour 2:22, 8 July 2020

I don't think it is a factually accurate conclusion to reach that the Government and our partners did not prioritise the social care sector in terms of the amount of support we've provided, both in extra cash support on an emergency basis, and the further amount of support that we're looking to find at a hard-pushed time as well. We've also provided significant amounts of personal protective equipment free to the social care sector at a time when their normal supply lines had collapsed. So, there's been a significant amount of support, including staffing as well.

When it comes to the antibody tests, I don't think that the figures are accurate. I'll happily look at the figures again and come back, not just to the Member, but more generally, because social care workers, health workers and education workers are three of the priority groups for the antibody test. And the antibody test is actually to help us understand the prevalence of coronavirus around the country at this point. The evidence on how long term an antibody response is, or indeed, the usefulness in terms of people's transmissability to other people, or indeed to help people recover or be immune from a further incidence of coronavirus is not clear, but it does certainly help us to understand how far coronavirus has spread. We'll continue to use the tests available to us to do so, and you can expect to see more of that in the testing strategy that I have already referred to.