Coronavirus and sharing data
The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care has given notice under Regulation 3(4) of the Health Service Control of Patient Information Regulations 2002 that the council is required to process and share necessary health and social care data for the following purposes:
- Understanding Covid-19 and risks to public health, trends in Covid-19 and such risks, and controlling and preventing the spread of Covid-19 and such risks
- Identifying and understanding information about patients or potential patients with or at risk of Covid-19, information about incidents of patient exposure to Covid-19 and the management of patients with or at risk of Covid-19 including: locating, contacting, screening, flagging and monitoring such patients and collecting information about and providing services in relation to testing, diagnosis, self-isolation, fitness to work, treatment, medical and social interventions and recovery from Covid-19
- Understanding information about patient access to health services and adult social care services and the need for wider care of patients and vulnerable groups as a direct or indirect result of Covid-19 and the availability and capacity of those services or that care
- Monitoring and managing the response to Covid-19 by health and social care bodies and the Government including providing information to the public about Covid-19 and its effectiveness and information about capacity, medicines, equipment, supplies, services and the workforce within the health services and adult social care services
- Delivering services to patients, clinicians, the health services and adult social care services workforce and the public about and in connection with Covid-19, including the provision of information, fit notes and the provision of health care and adult social care services
- Research and planning in relation to Covid-19
Test and Trace
We'll be assisting Public Health England (PHE) on the Covid-19 Test and Trace service. We'll ask you for basic contact details if you enter some of our buildings, eg. libraries, museums and children’s centres.
This data will be kept safely for 21 days and then securely destroyed. It will be shared with Public Health England’s Test and Trace service (if there is a positive case of COVID-19 identified that you may have been exposed to, PHE’s Test and Trace team may contact you).
Further details on why we need to do this is available at GOV.UK.
We'll also be exchanging personal data with PHE of patients and service users in order to make the contract tracing service as successful as possible. The council may use its existing databases to enable us to contact you by telephone or in person, if PHE’s contact tracers have been unable to contact you after you've tested positive for Covid-19.
Covid-19 help for vulnerable groups
As well as receiving data from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) in order to support people who may be shielding due to Covid-19 and receiving government food parcels, we'll also share personal data with:
- The Department for Environment
- Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA)
- Tesco
This is in order to help provide supermarket priority delivery slots to those who may not be deemed clinically extremely vulnerable, but still cannot go out for reasons such as self-isolation and disability.
Adults and Communities
Chief Executives
Children and Family Services
Corporate Resources
Local Government Pension Scheme