The emergency standards were introduced to help frontline service tackle the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) has announced a series of changes that will help the regulator get back to a “new normal”.
A number of the emergency standards of education which were introduced to assist frontline service during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic will be withdrawn by the end of September 2020.
Some of the emergency standards will be retained to allow flexibility during the next phase of the pandemic, to provide a more stable learning environment for students in all years, and to ensure current final year students can complete their courses and become fully registered professionals as they planned.
The regulator will also resume the investigation of fitness to practice cases and extend the deadline for Approved Education Institutions (AEI) to implement the NMC’s new Future Midwife Standards by one year, from September 2021 to September 2022.
The plans come as the UK cautiously transitions to a new phase in the COVID-19 pandemic.
Thank you.
Andrea Sutcliffe CBE, Chief Executive and Registrar for the NMC, said: “The pandemic has had a profound impact on how care and support for people is provided across all health and care settings. It has also deeply affected the working lives of the professionals on our register and disrupted the education of nursing and midwifery students across the UK.
“I would like to thank all the nurses, midwives, nursing associates and the nursing and midwifery students who have coped with these extraordinary circumstances and made such an amazing contribution to the UK’s Covid-19 response.
“As we all move cautiously and collaboratively from pandemic crisis to recovery, the time is right to take steps to help ensure the education and training of the next generation of nursing and midwifery professionals can transition to a new normal.
“At the NMC, we’re now also able to refocus our attention on some of our core regulatory activities – including the resumption of some substantive fitness to practise hearings in person in the safest possible way.
“Over the coming weeks and months we will be reviewing even more of our work as we continue to play our part in supporting the UK’s health and care workforce on the road to recovery.”
