Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment he has made of the (a) adequacy and (b) accessibility to prisoners of mental health services in prisons.
Answered by Jackie Doyle-Price
Improving the mental health of people in prison is a top priority for this Government.
We recognise that there are high numbers of people in prison with mental ill health. When people do go to prison, they should receive the same standard and access to National Health Service healthcare and mental health treatments and care as people in the community. The Department has not made a formal assessment of adequacy and accessibility of mental health services for people in prison.
However, work is underway to improve mental health services in prison. NHS England are focussing on an offender mental health pathway which will ensure that offenders are directed to the most appropriate intervention to their needs at the right time in the criminal justice system. The programme of work includes ensuring timely and appropriate transfers to a mental health hospital, timely remission to prison as part of a planned episode of care, and ensuring that those requiring treatment for mental ill health have access to high quality care.
New service specifications have been published for both low and medium secure hospitals as well as prison mental health services. The Prison Mental Health Specification embeds the Quality Standards for Prison Mental Health Services developed by the Royal College of Psychiatrists to ensure high quality care for all. Draft Guidance for Timely and Appropriate Transfers and Remissions of care to and from a mental health hospital is currently in production.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has made an assessment of the adequacy of local authority suicide prevention plans: and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Jackie Doyle-Price
The Department has worked in partnership with the local government sector to develop an approach to ensure the effectiveness of local suicide prevention plans.
In October 2018, local authorities were invited to complete a self-assessment of their local plans. The self-assessment responses and the local plans will be analysed by an independent researcher and the results will be considered by an expert panel. This process will help to identify areas for improvement for local plans and areas of best practice which can be shared across the local government sector. The results will also be used to inform a programme of mutual support over the next two to three years to enable local areas to learn from each other and to further develop their plans.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an assessment of the potential effect on the (a) health of under five year olds and (b) rate of childhood obesity of a reduction in the Nursery Milk Scheme.
Answered by Matt Hancock
The Government has no plans to make any changes to the eligibility for the Nursery Milk Scheme.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to ensure that people who are entitled to a free flu vaccination are aware that the vaccination can be obtained from pharmacies as well as from GP surgeries; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Steve Brine
The national ‘Help us help you: stay well this winter’ campaign promotes uptake of the flu vaccination and was launched on 8 October 2018. It will run until 17 December 2018.
Activity includes television, radio, social and digital advertising, supported by search, partnership activity and public relations.
The first phase highlights the seriousness of flu for at-risk groups and how vaccination offers the best protection. Public Health England advice is to speak to a general practitioner (GP), pharmacist or midwife.
This message is replicated across all advertising materials, including those for partners, with a minor variation in communications concerning flu vaccination for children. Children aged two and three are vaccinated by GPs and children in reception to year five are vaccinated at school.
The second phase encourages at-risk groups to get their flu vaccination and visit a pharmacist at the first sign of a winter illness.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will take steps to ensure that GPs contact patients who are entitled to a free flu vaccination invite those patients to be vaccinated.
Answered by Steve Brine
The general practitioner (GP) Contract and the ‘Directed Enhanced Service Specification; Seasonal influenza and pneumococcal polysaccharide vaccination programme 2018/19’ describes the service that GPs should offer. GPs are expected to proactively call eligible patients for vaccination and also to recall them if they are defined as at risk due to an underlying medical condition.
During each season, NHS England teams take all opportunities in their communication with practices to reinforce this requirement, and Public Health England have made available resources to encourage GPs to promote flu vaccination.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what proportion of people eligible for free flu vaccination have received that vaccine in each of the last five years for which figures are available.
Answered by Steve Brine
Data on the proportion of people eligible for a free flu vaccination that have received vaccine in each of the last five years is available in the attached table.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many local authorities have suicide prevention plans in place; and what steps he is taking to ensure that those plans are effective.
Answered by Matt Hancock
149 local authorities have a multi-agency suicide prevention plan in place. The remaining three local authorities are in the process of developing their plans, and Public Health England is supporting these final local authorities to have their plans in place as soon as possible.
The Department is working in collaboration with the local government sector to support areas to implement and embed their suicide prevention plans within their communities. The process started this month and will help to identify areas for improvement for local plans and areas of best practice which can be shared across the local government sector. This process will also be used to inform a programme of mutual support over the next two to three years to enable local areas to learn from each other and to further develop their plans.
Asked by: Helen Jones (Labour - Warrington North)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to (a) establish a national network of brain tumour centres and (b) encourage more researchers to enter the brain tumour research field.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
NHS England works closely with the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) to support cancer research centres across the country in Manchester, Oxford and Cambridge and NIHR Biomedical Research Centres at the Marsden-ICR and Manchester.
On 14 May the Government announced £40 million over the next five years for brain tumour research. This should help to encourage more researchers to enter the brain tumour research field. Funding will be invested through the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR). We have published a NIHR Highlight Notice, which calls for applications on brain tumour research across a range of NIHR research funding programmes plus NIHR Research Training programmes.
Through the NIHR we attract, develop and retain a highly skilled health and care research workforce. As part of this, NIHR training programmes were established to attract more researchers into applied and translational research. Since 2012 the NIHR has invested in excess of £5.8 million supporting seven individuals for research in the brain tumour research field.
A number of NIHR Biomedical Research Centres (BRCs) include research themes in brain tumour research and, included as part of these BRCs, are doctoral training programmes to bring through the next generation of research leaders.