HEALTH chiefs in East Lancashire are busy planning for Brexit.

East Lancs Clinical Commissioning Group joint chief officer, Dr Julie Higgins, updated CCG board members on work behind the scenes to ensure continuity when the UK leaves the EU.

Dr Higgins said: "Guidance has been released from Sir Chris Wormald, the Permanent Secretary. This follows from the Secretary of State, Matt Hancock’s, letter on Governments preparations for a March 2019 ‘no deal’ scenario, which focussed on supply chain implications and border planning assumptions to industry and the health and care system.

"The EU Exit Operational Readiness Guidance has been developed and agreed with NHS England and NHS Improvement to set out local actions that providers and commissioners of health and adult social care service should take to prepare for the EU exit.

"NHS England and NHS Improvement are to establish regional and national teams to enable rapid support on emerging local incidents and escalation to the new Operational Response Centre.

"The letter confirms that delivering the delivering the deal remains the government’s top priority and is the best ‘no deal’ mitigation. But in line with the government’s principal operational focus on national ‘no deal’ planning, actions must be taken locally to manage risks of a ‘no deal’ exit.

"Within East Lancashire work has already begun in support of this, through the Business Impact Analyses (BIA) undertaken by CCG managers, in assessing critical functions for business continuity in case of a major incident and, through collation of information for the submission of the Emergency Preparedness, Resilience and Response (EPRR) Core Standards.

"Next steps are to review the CCGs business continuity management system, along with partners and providers, and escalate any significant issues that may arise from a ‘No Deal’ exit.

"Every service can potentially be affected by one or more of the above and there are no exceptions to completing a revised Business Impact Analysis with immediate effect.

"There is support available for all teams to complete these; The [Pennine Lancs CCG] EPRR Task & Finish Group will coordinate the responses.

"Further operational guidance will be provided to support the health and care system to prepare for the UK leaving the EU before 29 March 2019."

In December, the Department of Health and Social Care issued The EU Exit Operational Readiness Guidance, summarising the Government’s contingency plans and covers actions that all health and adult social care organisations should take in

preparation for EU Exit.

All organisations receiving this guidance were advised to undertake local EU Exit readiness planning, local risk assessments and plan for wider potential impacts.

In addition, the actions in this guidance cover seven areas of activity in the health and care system that the Department of Health and Social Care is focussing on in its ‘no deal’ exit contingency

planning.

The main concerns for preparations are the supply of medicines and vaccines, supply of medical devices and clinical consumables and supply of non-clinical consumables, goods and services;

Potential workforce issues are being considered, as are reciprocal healthcare, research and clinical trials, and data sharing, processing and access.

The guideance added: "The impact of a ‘no deal’ exit on the health and adult social care sector is not limited to these areas, and the department is also developing contingency plans to mitigate risks in other areas."