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GOOD AFTERNOON and welcome to my regular South West Surrey update No. 139. If you’ve been forwarded this email and find it useful sign up to get your personal copy here. ([link removed]) You can of course unsubscribe at any time.

PANDEMIC UPDATE As of today, we had a total of 4,516,892 positive cases of COVID-19 with 127,840 confirmed deaths in the UK. There have been 5,902 confirmed cases in Waverley and sadly 246 confirmed deaths, with an estimated 18 active cases in Waverley. All data is accurate as of 11am this morning.

VACCINE LATEST 68,788+ people in South West Surrey have now been vaccinated with at least one dose and around 42,291 have had the second. Nationally, 76.6% of adults have been inoculated once for coronavirus ([link removed]) , whilst 52.5% of adults have had both doses - fantastic progress. Congratulations to Kate Bingham, the head of the UK Vaccines Taskforce who will be honoured with a damehood ([link removed]) . In other news, the latest R range for England is 1.0 to 1.2 ([link removed]) and in the last week in the UK: coronavirus cases ⬆️49% but hospital admissions ⬇️0.3%, and deaths ⬇️1.7%.

DELTA VARIANT aka the Indian strain has been shown to be 40% more transmissible than the Alpha (Kent) variant ([link removed]) making the easing of lockdown restrictions on 21 June a more finely balanced decision. The government is currently weighing up whether to proceed with further easing of restrictions on June 21st. Some decisions in government are ‘no brainers’ but this is a genuinely difficult one: on the one hand, the link between new COVID-19 cases and hospitalisations seems to have been broken by the vaccine programme. On the other hand, we know those same vaccines are more than twice as effective when people have had two jabs, which is only a matter of weeks later. Here’s ([link removed]) another great Twitter thread from Chris Hopson, CEO of NHS Providers debating the risks and trade-offs. The good news is that those aged 25+ and below
will be offered the vaccine from this week ([link removed]) .

CANCER & COVID There is another reason which is likely to tip the balance against marching full speed ahead with easing, and that is the impact of even a small rise in hospitalisations on other illnesses being treated by the NHS. In the last three months, the NHS has been getting its head around the enormous backlog faced by the service. Around 40,000 fewer people started cancer treatment last year compared to the previous year and many more have seen surgery for painful hip and knee problems delayed. The number of people waiting over a year for surgery has risen from practically zero to over 300,000. Read more on this in my article in the Herald here ([link removed]) .

The key number to remember for anyone with pandemic-related difficulties remains 0300 200 1008 the Surrey Helpline run by Surrey County Council (Mon-Fri 9 am to 5 pm).

WHAT’S GOING ON IN WESTMINSTER

VACCINES FOR ALL Whatever the debate on foreign aid, we can all welcome the Prime Minister’s commitment to rapid, equitable access to safe and effective vaccines with a £548 million commitment to the COVAX Advance Market Commitment (AMC). This will provide a massive 1.3 billion vaccine doses to 92 developing countries in 2021, sufficient to vaccinate up to 20% of recipient country populations, prioritising healthcare workers and then expanding to cover other priority groups. COVAX deliveries are now well underway: the first were received in Ghana on 24 February. However - and I know this is not popular with everyone - I do think we should reconsider the cut in our aid budget. I understand the government is committed to restoring the 0.7% commitment, but why not then next year when our economy will return to pre-pandemic levels? I actually spoke to the PM about this issue this morning and at the time of writing it is still not clear if there will actually be a vote on the issue.

PATIENT SAFETY Some of you may know my big priority as Health Security was reducing the high levels of avoidable harm and death in modern healthcare systems. As a result of my campaigning the World Health Organisation (WHO) established World Patient Safety Day which happens on Sept 17th every year. This year they have also published their first-ever Global Patient Safety Action Plan 2021-2030 ([link removed]) with an overall goal to eliminate avoidable deaths and harm around the world. Back in 2019, I formed a new charity called Patient Safety Watch that conducts research into the levels of preventable harm in healthcare systems in England. If you are also interested in patient safety, please do sign up for my other weekly newsletter here ([link removed]) .

STOP SEXUAL VIOLENCE No foreign secretary did more to stop sexual violence being used as a weapon of conflict than William Hague. We should listen what he says about the horrors in Tigray today and use the G7 to take decisive action to stop history from being repeated. William’s excellent Times article here ([link removed]) .

WHAT’S GOING ON IN SOUTH WEST SURREY

CANCER IMPROVEMENTS I had a productive meeting with Neil Dardis, the Chief Executive of the Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust about what he would like to do to improve cancer care locally. Top of his list was addressing staffing shortages in certain posts - he particularly wants more histopathologists, oncologists and radiologists. Nationally I have been pushing for an overhaul of our NHS workforce planning ([link removed]) so will continue to do what I can to support Neil. In May I spoke at a meeting hosted by the British Society of Interventional Radiology to discuss how to clear scan backlogs, meet safe staffing quotas and keep up with demand.

SURREY JABS In Waverley, 59% of the population have had at least one dose of the jab. More widely in Surrey, 27,990+ people in total have received their first dose in Surrey, and 51,877 had their second. The latest data shows that Reigate and Banstead and Epsom and Ewell are areas of concern due to a rapid increase in COVID-19 cases. For information on coronavirus testing in Surrey, click here ([link removed]) .

See my list of local groups working to support vulnerable residents here ([link removed]) .

THE ECONOMY AND JOBS

TAX & TECH GIANTS The Chancellor and his G7 counterparts have agreed to tax multinational companies more, thereby reforming the system and tackling tax avoidance. The Finance ministers of the G7 group of advanced economies clearly had a productive summit and even decided on a global minimum corporate tax rate of 15% to stop companies like Facebook and Amazon shifting their profits to tax havens - something that matters increasingly because of all the shopping we do online. Good too that climate change was also on their agenda. More information here ([link removed]) .

WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON

ASYMP-TOMATO-IC Two lorries crashed on the A14 near Godmanchester, Cambridgeshire last week ([link removed]) , leading to a road closure due to the spillage of tomato puree. Thankfully, no one was badly injured, although everyone was left red-faced… perhaps the Council needs to hire Jean Brookes who uses a hairdryer as a fake speed gun ([link removed]) .
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Promoted by Sean Donovan-Smith on behalf of Jeremy Hunt MP and South West Surrey Conservatives, all at 2 Royal Parade, Tilford Road, Hindhead, Surrey GU26 6TD.

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