Third Report - Coronavirus: lessons learned to date

The government acknowledges the NHS's limited surge capacity and states this experience should lead to more explicit, monitored surge capacity in long-term NHS organisation and funding. It also commits to developing new IPC protocols for pandemics and conducting comprehensive analysis of current latent capacity in critical care units.

The government accepts the recommendation by explicitly restating it, indicating that comprehensive analysis will be carried out to assess the safety of the NHS's limited latent capacity, particularly in critical care units.

The government accepts the recommendation, stating that NHS England has commissioned Health Education England to develop proposals enabling NHS staff to change clinical specialty mid-career and train in sub-specialties, alongside other initiatives to support flexible working and staff deployment.

The government accepted the recommendation, stating that Public Health England, its successors, ministers, and scientific advisers should be more willing to study and emulate practices from other countries, and a culture of proactive collaboration should be established.

The government commits that future policy development will be characterised by greater questioning and challenge, with Ministers taking a more robust approach to scientific advice, and SAGE facilitating strong external challenge from diverse experts globally.

The government committed to adopting an approach of greater questioning and challenge in future policy development, stating ministers should be more robust and that SAGE should facilitate strong external and structured challenge to scientific advice.

The government committed to adopting an approach of greater questioning and challenge in future policy development, stating ministers should be more robust and that SAGE should facilitate strong external and structured challenge to scientific advice.

The government directly accepted the recommendation, stating that a more robust approach to questioning and challenging scientific advice should characterise future policy development, and that ministers, government, and SAGE should facilitate structured external challenge.

The government accepts the underlying concern, stating that future policy development will involve greater questioning and challenge from ministers, and SAGE will facilitate strong external and structured challenge to scientific advice from diverse disciplines and international experts.

The government accepts the underlying concern, stating that future policy development will involve greater questioning and challenge from ministers, and SAGE will facilitate strong external and structured challenge to scientific advice from diverse disciplines and international experts.

The government accepts that future policy development should be characterised by greater questioning and challenge, urging Ministers to robustly scrutinise advice and for the government and SAGE to facilitate strong external challenge to scientific advice.

The government commits to a future approach characterized by greater questioning and challenge in policy development. Ministers will robustly challenge scientific advice, and the government and SAGE will facilitate strong external challenge from diverse international experts.

The government commits to adopting a future approach of greater questioning and challenge in policy development, encouraging ministers to challenge advice and facilitating strong external and international expert challenge to scientific advice.

The government agrees on the importance of public health communications but highlights its past messaging as strong and effective, without committing to new actions or a revised strategy to address current issues with trust and misinformation.

The government states it will, via the World Health Organisation, advocate for an international standard for reporting COVID-19 deaths and a framework for reporting disease-related deaths in future pandemics.

The government fully accepts the recommendation, reiterating that a greater questioning and challenging approach should characterize policy development, with Ministers taking a robust approach to scientific advice and facilitating external and structured challenge from diverse global experts.

The government accepts the recommendation and commits to publishing scientific advice from SAGE co-chairs within 24 hours of being given or policy being decided, and SAGE minutes and papers within 48 hours of meetings.

The government commits to building a resilient and scalable test, trace, and isolate infrastructure for future threats, working with local authorities to ensure future contact tracing capabilities, and leveraging UKHSA's established relationships.

The government accepts the recommendation to ensure robust plans for rapidly scaling up test, trace, and isolate programmes in future health emergencies. It highlights UKHSA's existing capacity for PCR and LFD testing, its ability to scale up within 72 hours, and its commitment to continuing to develop these capabilities and ensure resilient infrastructure.

The government accepts the recommendation, affirming the importance of rapidly scaling up test, trace, and isolate programmes. It highlights UKHSA's current capacity (700k-800k PCR tests/day and 2.5m LFD tests/day) and commits to continue developing capacity and ensuring a resilient infrastructure for future health threats.

The government accepts the recommendation, agreeing on the importance of robust plans and capabilities to rapidly scale up test, trace, and isolate programmes in future emergencies. It details UKHSA's current surge capacity (700k-800k PCR tests/day and 2.5m LFD tests/day) and commits to continuing capacity development and ensuring a resilient, scalable infrastructure.

The government accepts the recommendation, affirming the importance of rapidly scaling up test, trace, and isolate programmes in future health emergencies. It details UKHSA's current surge capacity (700k-800k PCR tests/day and 2.5m LFD tests/day) and commits to continuing capacity development and ensuring a resilient, scalable infrastructure.

The government accepts the recommendation to ensure robust plans for rapidly scaling up test, trace, and isolate programmes in future health emergencies. It states UKHSA already has significant PCR and LFD testing capacity and commits to continuing to develop capabilities and ensure resilient infrastructure.

The government states it accepts the recommendation and details that the resourcing and capabilities of the Civil Contingencies Secretariat (CCS) have already been improved, with additional staff, a restructured secretariat, and transferred functions.

The government accepts the conclusion that the NHS runs hot with little spare capacity, outlining existing steps taken to increase capacity, including beds and staff, and committing to future investment in additional capacity and improved management.

The government accepts the recommendation and is actively working to improve data sharing arrangements, including developing a data strategy via the Civil Contingencies Secretariat, and affirms existing mechanisms are in place for dispute resolution.

The government accepts the recommendation, highlighting the existing established role of the Armed Forces in supporting UK resilience and the collaborative work between the MoD, CCS, and civil authorities, and commits to continuing to improve this collaboration.

The government accepts the recommendation, committing to ensuring future policy is developed through robust questioning, drawing on diverse expertise, and continuously learning lessons. It notes the Cabinet Office and Government Office for Science are leading work to strengthen government's futures capability, including external challenge and international engagement.

The government accepts the observation, committing to strengthening proactive collaboration and confirming that UKHSA will maintain established relationships with local tracing arrangements.

The government accepts the recommendation for transparency, stating that UKHSA already operates within transparency guidance, publishes a wide range of operational data, and releases contracts over £10,000 within 90 days. It also reaffirms its commitment to using lessons learned for future public health planning.

The government accepts the recommendation to ensure robust and scalable test, trace, and isolate programmes for future health emergencies. It highlights UKHSA's current capacity to conduct and scale up PCR and LFD testing within 72 hours, and commits to continuing to develop its capabilities and ensure resilient infrastructure.

The government acknowledges the longstanding pressures on the social care sector and states its 'Build Back Better' plan addresses these through a clear programme of reform, proposals for a sustainable funding model, and initiatives to integrate health and social care.

The government accepts the recommendation, stating it is committed to better preparing the social care sector and has acted to enhance social care's prominence within DHSC and NHS. It outlines plans to retain Social Care Taskforce expertise and details specific funding and initiatives from the 'Build Back Better' plan, including £500m for workforce support and £300m for housing integration.

The government accepts the recommendation and commits to publishing a white paper that will set out a 10-year vision for social care reform, addressing the call for urgency and parity with the NHS.

The government accepts the recommendation and is funding IPC training for social care staff, providing free PPE until March 2023, has launched an Infection Control Fund, and provides updated guidance on care home visiting.

The government states it accepts the recommendation and details a range of measures already implemented throughout the pandemic, including increased testing, new guidance, blended annual health checks, and a newly published acute care toolkit.

The government states it accepts the importance of clear DNACPR guidance, noting it aligns with ongoing work by the Ministerial Oversight Group. It highlights the publication of Universal Principles for Advance Care Planning and patient-facing guidance on nhs.uk as existing actions addressing the concern.