NHS: Hospital Waiting Times
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
My noble friend raises a specific issue I am not aware of. If she wants to write to me with the details, we will look into that. As I said in a previous answer, the Government have introduced a significant number of community diagnostic centres, where such blood analysis can be done. The whole point of the centres is that tests can be done very quickly to ascertain whether any further surgery is required. If my noble friend writes to me, I will respond to her directly.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, can we get back to the Question? The Minister said that the information asked for is not kept centrally. Will he accept that the latest figures show an average of 750 people each week die prematurely from cardiovascular conditions, including heart attacks, coronary heart disease and stroke? That is 39,000 people per year. Many of those are waiting too long on a hospital waiting list. When can we expect the major conditions strategy to be published and will it deal with this really pressing problem?
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The noble Lord makes an important point. Excess deaths from all causes involving cardiovascular disease have reduced year on year since 2020 to December 2023. Relative excess deaths involving cardiovascular diseases were higher in the years prior to that—2021 and 2022. Clearly, we still have a lot more to do on that front.
NHS: General Medical Practitioners
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow(6 months ago)
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Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of St Albans asks an important question but the recovery plan introduced new measures to support international medical students, who make up more than half of all doctors in GP training, so if we were to stop those students coming over we would be in real trouble ourselves. On his wider point he is absolutely right, but it is not just GPs and doctors; it is also healthcare professionals in social services and elsewhere.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, I declare an interest as a member of the GMC. On the increase in training places in medical schools, which is of course very welcome, does the Minister agree that this will not come off unless we increase the number of people training the GPs? Will he arrange for discussions between himself, the GMC, medical schools and NHS England to ensure that we get enough people to come in as trainers to enable even the modest workforce projections that are in the plan for medical schools to be put into action?
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
I absolutely agree with the noble Lord. If he is inviting me to do something with that, I will certainly take it back to the department based on his question.
Dementia Diagnosis
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
I thank the noble Lord for his question and pay tribute to his work on the APPG on Dementia. Timely diagnosis of dementia is vital to ensure that a person with dementia can access advice, information, care and support to help them live well with the condition and remain independent for as long as possible. NHS England is committed to increasing dementia diagnosis rates. NHS England’s 2023/24 Priorities and Operational Planning Guidance provides a clear direction for ICBs to support the delivery of timely diagnosis with systems.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, will the Minister tell the House what has happened to the pilots that were announced, due to start earlier in the year, about the identification of dementia? In particular, will they deal with the very large variation in diagnosis rates across the country?
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The noble Lord raises a very important point. He is right that there is substantial variation across integrated care boards in dementia diagnosis rates. NHS England has commissioned a dementia intelligence network to develop a resource to investigate that very issue. It is important that we learn from the very best so that we can put in place an industry-standard best practice to make sure that we get the very best across the country.
Health: Cardiac Arrest
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
My Lords, I believe this is the noble Baroness’s 1,000th contribution to your Lordships’ House, so I congratulate her—that is some feat. She asked a very good, topical question. All state-funded schools are required to teach first aid as part of the mandatory relationships, sex and health education curriculum. This involves children aged over 12 being taught CPR and how to use a defibrillator.
To improve survival rates for out-of-hospital cardiac arrest cases, the NHS long-term plan sets out that a national network of community first responders and automated external defibrillators will help save up to 4,000 lives each year by 2028. NHS England are working with St John Ambulance to increase the awareness of the importance of CPR in England. Learning from other countries, as the noble Baroness said, is exactly right and it is very important that the NHS does learn from other countries to continually improve. With regard to first responder vehicles, including in the police and fire service, carrying defibrillators, it is a very good question and I will take this back to my colleagues in the Home Office.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, I am very glad that the Minister said that this was a priority for the Government, but can I ask him to look at the UK out-of-hospital cardiac arrest outcomes project? The current 2023 figures show that the survival rate after 30 days is 11% in London but 5.3% in the West Midlands. Will he call in the integrated care systems in the West Midlands to see what they are doing to improve? That is a very big discrepancy between those two rates.
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The noble Lord is very knowledgeable about the West Midlands. I will certainly take that specific point back to the department.
Blood Donation
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
My noble friend raises a very important point. We welcome the approval and introduction of crizanlizumab to help treat sickle cell patients, and we hope that this promising advance will have a major impact on the reduction of painful episodes and improve the quality of life for patients suffering from sickle cell disorders. Although this is a positive step, it is vital that people living with sickle cell disorders continue to get regular blood transfusions and red cell exchanges. This does not change the increasing need to have patients with ethnically matched blood, so my noble friend raises a good point.
She asked what we are doing. There is a range of techniques to increase awareness of the need to donate. NHSBT continues to invest and to prioritise the diversification of its donor base, and increasing the supply of Ro Kell-negative blood is one of its priorities. It is being supported through increased investment in marketing and the engagement of donors of black Caribbean and black African ethnicity, who are more likely to have this blood type.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, I understand that the authority has a community grants programme designed to encourage more donations from black and minority-ethnic people. Can the Minister say a little more about how successful that has been and whether the Government intend to put more resources into it in future?
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The number of regular donors of black heritage reached an all-time high of almost 20,000 in the year to April 2023. In addition, 7,427 people of black heritage gave blood for the first time between April 2022 and 2023. This year, the NHS needs 12,000 new black heritage donors, and we are working to that. The latest plan launched in National Blood Week focused on black heritage recruitment. We are making extremely good progress in England, but there is still a lot to do.
Metastatic and Secondary Breast Cancer
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The Government and the NHS are committed to delivering the elective recovery plan, published in February 2022, and we are making good progress. The Government will publish a major conditions strategy, setting out a strong and coherent policy agenda that sets out a shift to integrated, whole-person care, including for cancers. The major conditions strategy will apply a geographical lens to each condition and address regional disparities in health outcomes in an interim report to be published this summer.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, the Minister referred to the major conditions strategy, but behind that lies the decision to scrap the 10-year NHS England cancer plan. Is it really wise to move priority away from cancer, given the poor outcomes in this country?
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The noble Lord is right to mention the 10-year cancer plan because we are doubling down and we are committed to improving cancer outcomes in this country. We have made significant progress.
Drugs: Supply and Availability
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
My Lords, it looks like we have a good and sunny summer so far. The department recognises the important role that sunscreen creams play in preventing skin cancers by providing vital UVA and UVB protection. Suncreams are cosmetic products rather than medicines. The supply of cosmetic products is commercially driven and there is an extensive range of these products, with wide availability on the open market. Sunscreen creams may also be prescribed by clinicians if clinically appropriate, taking into account any NHS England guidance. I am not aware that there is a shortage of suncreams at the moment.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, the noble Lord says that he has a well-ordered system. Will he confirm that the number of price concessions—in other words, price increases—agreed to by his department when medicines are in short supply has shot up in recent months and that community pharmacies have to pay the gap between the set price and the newly agreed price? It then takes a long time for those community pharmacies to be compensated. Will he look at speeding up the compensation for community pharmacies?
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
Community pharmacies play a vital role in our communities. I will certainly take on board what the noble Lord has said and look into that.
Secondary Metastatic Breast Cancer
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
In an answer I gave just a moment ago, I referred to the Autumn Statement—from 2022, just last autumn—providing additional funds of £3.3 billion. But on the precise question that the noble Baroness asked, I am afraid I will have to write to her.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
Can the Minister guarantee to the House that the long-awaited workforce plan will contain specific numbers and targets for each clinical group—numbers to be trained over the next 10 or 15 years, accompanied by a commitment from the Treasury to fund those places? Otherwise, it will be a waste of time.
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The noble Lord raises a very good point, and I will feed that back to the department.
Brain Tumours
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath
To ask His Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to improve the scale of research into the causes and treatment of brain tumours.
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
My Lords, I am hugely grateful to the noble Lord for bringing this challenge to my attention and pay tribute to the work that he does on the APPG. We are working closely with research partners. I am pleased to say that more research is being funded, as we continue to encourage more researchers to become involved in what remains a challenging scientific area with a relatively small research community. I am confident that the Government’s continued commitment to funding will help us make progress towards effective treatment.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, this is a devastating disease and I welcome the Government’s doubling of the £20 million grant for research to £40 million in memory of my late friend Baroness Jowell. Unfortunately, of that £40 million, I understand that only about £8.8 million has so far been allocated. Can the Minister assure me that that £40 million fund will be ring-fenced purely for brain tumour research? Secondly, will the National Institute for Health and Care Research give proper feedback to researchers who have had their projects rejected so that they can resubmit their applications with more hope of success?
Community Pharmacies
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The noble Baroness raises several good points there. From my personal experience of pharmacies, they do have access to those records, but unfortunately that is not across the board and there is still more to be done on that front.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, would the Minister like to have another go at answering the question from the noble Lord, Lord Grade? I did not really get from him any sense of how the Government are dealing with the crisis in community pharmacy. There has been a 30% cut in real terms since 2015. As he said, many independent pharmacies are going to the wall. They are faced today with huge inflationary pressures, yet all we get are platitudes from the Government. When will they do something?
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
My Lords, they are private businesses and some close, some open and there are changes. As I said in an answer I gave earlier, there are still the same number of pharmacies as there were 10 years ago.
Medical Devices and Equipment
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The noble Baroness raises an important point. As it is outside the Question and the remit I have here, I cannot give her a robust enough answer, I fear, so I will write to her.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, surely at the heart of this Question—and it relates to China—is that what we learned during the pandemic is that we were overreliant on supplies from China. The Government say that they wish to encourage alternative sources of supply, including from UK companies. However, we hear from those companies that the cost pressure on them means that they cannot invest sufficiently to produce alternative sources of supply. What is the Government’s approach to ensuring that we are not dependent on China in the way that left us so exposed during the pandemic?
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The noble Lord raises an important point. Unfortunately, we were far more reliant on China, not just in the NHS but elsewhere in our economy. However, contracts and framework agreements fixed prices to provide budgetary certainty for the NHS and to avoid the need for frequent price reviews or constant retendering, which are inefficient for the NHS and for suppliers. When I reflect on my business career, I know from that context that the NHS is a very good customer, providing security on payment for goods and services, working under equitable terms and conditions of contract, and being prepared to encourage the concerns of suppliers facing exceptional pressures. It is a very good customer.
Eating Disorder Services: Men
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
I thank my noble friend for that very good point. Eating disorders are serious, life-threatening conditions which can affect people of any age, gender, ethnicity or background. People with eating disorders can face stigma, which can stop them reaching out for help and reaching their true potential. We have committed to offer all state schools and colleges a grant to train a senior mental health lead by 2025, enabling them to introduce effective, whole-school approaches to mental health and well-being. This is backed by £10 million in 2022-23. More than 8,000 schools and colleges, including half of state-funded secondary schools, have taken up the offer so far.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Chisholm, suggested that men may be reluctant to see their doctor or seek advice on some health issues, which has been very well researched. One of the puzzles is why the Government seem to have set their face against establishing a men’s health strategy, given that health outcomes for men can be so poor in so many parts of the country. Will the Minister’s department give this further consideration and come forward with proposals to establish such a strategy?
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
The noble Lord raises a very good point, which I agree with. I will take his excellent question back to the department and come back to him on it. In terms of this Question, a significant number of young people affected are females and a relatively small part are young men, but the whole strategy will encompass all men and women.
Cancer Therapies Access
Debate between Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and Lord Evans of Rainow
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
My Lords, I do not have a specific answer to that question, but I can certainly respond in writing.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)
My Lords, behind this Question lies an even more worrying fact, which is that the NHS is very, very slow to adopt new medicines and new treatments. Does the Minister accept that our very poor outcomes for cancer in relation to many OECD countries are partly down to this lack of adoption of proven new treatments? What are the Government doing to turn this around?