A total of 69 people who worked for Britain’s National Health Service have died of COVID-19 while the number of staff in care homes for the elderly who have died from the disease is not known, foreign minister Dominic Raab said on Wednesday.
The government is under pressure over accusations it has failed to deliver personal protective equipment to all the medical and care staff who require it.
“We’ve delivered 1 billion items of personal protective equipment and tens of millions have been distributed via the devolved administrations (semi-autonomous governments of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland),” Raab told parliament.
“We recognise though that we have got to strive even harder in this incredibly difficult and competitive international environment to source the equipment.”