To ask the Minister of Health to detail the data or information he requries before moving on to the next stage of opening up care homes to visitors.

“Visiting With Care – A Pathway”, sets out the approach to supporting safe and proportionate increases to visiting in care homes, and includes a commitment to scheduled reviews being undertaken to decide on progress along the pathway back to more normalised visiting.

The guidance states that the Public Health Expert Reference Group will review and analyse surveillance data as follows:

1. Community prevalence

2. Care Home Outbreak status

3. Care Home COVID-19 Testing results

4. Mortality associated with COVID in Care Homes

5. Hospital admissions

6. Vaccination status of staff and residents in care homes

The first scheduled review of the updated guidance around visiting in care home settings in Northern Ireland was completed as scheduled on 4 June 2021. However, following the significant easements which had come into place, both in care homes and in the general population over the preceding few weeks, and given the normal expected time delay in the impacts of those changes upon items 1-5 above, the review group decided to defer its decision for a week to allow collection and collation of data to better inform their decision.

The review group has since reconvened, and confirmed that, at this stage, it would not be appropriate to move forward to the second full stage of the Pathway. A further review has been scheduled for 9 July and I expect to be able to provide a further updates shortly thereafter.