Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 2:56 pm on 2 November 2021.
Thanks very much, Russell, for many, many questions there. I'm not sure I'll get through them all but I'll give them a go. First of all, on the beds in Wales, and the number of beds in hospitals, my understanding is that the number of beds that have been quoted did not include, for example, the field hospital beds and, of course, doesn't take into account the fact that the situation is different compared to the past, because we have to take into account the social distancing that needs to be taken into consideration because of COVID. On top of that, you need to understand that the average length of stay is significantly reduced compared to what has happened in the past, and there is a rolling closure of wards for cleaning purposes. So, all of those things mean that the situation is different compared to the past. But I do think that it's important for us to remember that, actually, keeping people out of hospital is what should be our intention, and getting them out of hospital as soon as we can because of the kind of infections that you can catch in hospital, and because, frankly, you're more likely to get the kind of rehabilitation that you need in your community.
On boosters, I'm pleased to say that we're doing very well in Wales, and we're following the same priorities as we did in the first round, and that is making sure that we actually do it in line with the vulnerability of people. So, we have people over the age of 50 within those categories of one to nine, but we're working through them in a very systematic way so that, obviously, care home residents have been some of the first to have been offered. I'm pleased to say that about 68 per cent of care home residents have already had their booster jabs, as have about 54 per cent of care home workers and NHS workers. So, these are the first categories that we're looking at. We're not going to be opening it up to a free-for-all in the way that they have in England. We'll be more systematic than that, following the kind of advice that the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation gave in the first round.
When it comes to face coverings, I am very saddened to see that people are not taking this seriously. This is certainly not a common situation throughout Wales. The majority, I think, are still abiding by our laws. And let's underline that—it is actually a law to wear a face covering in certain public places in Wales, and we did, of course, have many robust discussions within Cabinet about this, in particular about how we enforce it. And I'm pleased to say that Ministers Lesley Griffiths and Vaughan Gething have been meeting with supermarkets to talk to them about their responsibility of enforcing face coverings. It is a legal requirement and we expect them to enforce that.
In terms of household isolation, this is something now that we are strongly advising people to do. If somebody in your house has COVID, then we're asking you to self-isolate. And if children, for example, have a PCR test and it comes back negative, there is still an expectation on them to take a lateral flow test for seven days, so that we shore up that potential of them developing it later, so that we are clearer about trying to keep it out of our schools.
In relation to COVID passes, I must say that what we've seen is that they have been quite successful. Certainly, when it comes to the rugby on the weekend, the kind of spot-check implementation that we saw did seem to work quite effectively. People got to the stadium about half an hour before they usually would. So, the Welsh Rugby Union certainly seemed quite satisfied with the way things worked out there.