THE Government must address “widening health inequality” in UK communities as part of its response to the first report of the UK Covid-19 inquiry, the Bishop of London, the Rt Revd Sarah Mullally, has said.
The report by Baroness Hallett, who chairs the inquiry, was published in July. It focuses on the resilience and preparedness of the UK in the face of a global pandemic. More reports are to be published on other areas, including health-care systems, vaccines, the economic response, and children and young people.
“I wonder whether we have really and completely understood the impact” of health inequality during the pandemic, Bishop Mullally told the House of Lords during a debate on Tuesday evening on the Government’s response to the inquiry.
“We were all affected, but we were not equally affected. . . What action are the Government taking to address the widening health inequalities in our communities, not just for future pandemics but for now?”
Trust in the NHS had been damaged because of the inequalities exposed during the crisis, she suggested. In her own research, she had come across instances of “culturally incompetent care”, including a “Sikh man in Southall, who had had a stroke and was unable to speak, who had his moustache and beard cut without obtaining the permission or seeking the consent of his family.
“This was deeply offensive, and, after investigation, it was found there was no medical reason for it to have occurred.”
There was also, she said, a “lack of understanding from statutory bodies of the provision for their communities that faith groups had held for generations”.
Faith groups had been rightly identified as important partners in a crisis, the Bishop continued, including their involvement in vaccine rollout and health campaigns; but “that engagement has not been sustained. Forming relationships in a moment of crisis is not the way that resilient and interconnected communities are built. . . If we are to make a serious and sustained effort to tackle health inequalities, faith groups must be involved.”
Bishop Mullally asked what progress the Government was making to engage with faith groups “not just in the moment of crisis but over the long term”. She concluded by calling for “serious reform” of social care.
Responding to the four-hour debate, Baroness Merron acknowledged contributions on “inequalities and the inequalities outcome”.
And, although the Bishop had not mentioned death and funerals in her speech, Baroness Merron said that she recognised “the Rt Revd Prelate’s concerns about the issues around how death and funerals were dealt with, and the pain and distress caused by the lack of appropriate treatment of the deceased. The Government would be keen to engage with community and faith groups in the resilience review so that we can get this and other things right in future.”
Among the Conservative peers to contribute to the debate was Lord Frost, who argued that a culture change was needed in society for any future learning system to be successfully implemented.
He suggested: “Most of civil society, trade unions, and faith groups — including the Church of England — all pushed for the most risk-averse policies possible. All other political parties pressed for more and tougher lockdowns, more working from home, more public money, and more debt.”
The current Prime Minister, he said, had warned in July 2021 that lifting all restrictions would have “deadly consequences”. Lord Frost said: “It never happened. Not for the first time, and probably not for the last, he turned out to be talking nonsense.”
Government mortality reports from the time put the number of coronavirus deaths in August 2021 at 2989 people — up from 1591 people in July 2021.
Baroness Neville-Rolfe also mentioned faith groups, saying that they “were also important, although personally I was very saddened by the closure of churches during the first lockdown”.