Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department has taken to recruit and retain (a) pharmacists and (b) pharmacy prescription checkers.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
The Department closely monitors the market to ensure people in England have good access to National Health Service pharmaceutical services. Despite the increase in pharmacy closures seen in recent years, there are a similar number of pharmacies to ten years ago and 80% of the population live within 20 minutes’ walking distance of a pharmacy.
Every three years local authorities in England undertake pharmaceutical needs assessments for their areas to ensure provision continues to meet their population’s needs. The number of pharmacist training places annually is uncapped. In England, each year around 2,500 pharmacists enter training and the net increase in pharmacists practicing across all sectors is around 1,400 per year since 2016. NHS England are also investing £15.9 million to increase the number of pharmacy staff in primary and community care and develop skills in the existing workforce.
We have commissioned NHS England to develop a long term workforce plan for the next 15 years. This plan will help ensure that we have the right numbers of staff, with the right skills, to transform and deliver high quality services fit for the future.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps are being taken to (a) retain and (b) train and recruit dentists.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
In July 2022, we announced a package of dental system improvements to increase access for National Health Service dental patients and make NHS dentistry more attractive to practices, including steps to support the dental workforce.
NHS England negotiated amendments to the NHS dental contract to ensure dentists are remunerated more fairly for providing complex treatment within current Band 2 treatments, and enabling better use of skill mix in NHS dental practices.
We have recently simplified the General Dental Council's (GDC) legislative framework for the registration of international dentists and dental care professionals to increase the dental workforce. The legislative changes came into force on 8 March 2023.
Training programmes for healthcare professionals must meet the standards set by the regulatory body for their profession. The standard of training for dentists is the responsibility of the GDC who set the outcome standards expected at undergraduate level and approve courses and Higher Education Institutions to write and teach the curricula content that enables their students to meet the regulators outcome standards
We will announce our plan for further reform of the NHS dental system shortly. To support the workforce as a whole, we have commissioned NHS England to develop a long-term workforce plan for the NHS workforce for the next 15 years to ensure that we have the right numbers of staff with the right skills to transform and deliver high quality services fit for the future.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many dental practices in Oxford West and Abingdon constituency are not accepting new NHS patients.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
On 25 November 2022 we introduced a contractual responsibility for National Health Service dentists to keep their NHS.UK profiles up to date so that patients can find a dentist more easily. Practices are required to update their NHS.UK profiles at least once every 90 days, including information on whether they are accepting new patients. Information is available at the following link:
https://www.nhs.uk/service-search/find-a-dentist
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
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 include active monitoring in cancer care planning.
Answered by Helen Whately - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England is providing over £390 million in cancer service development funding to Cancer Alliances in each of the next two years to support the delivery of priorities in cancer, including working to ensure that every person receives personalised care and support from cancer diagnosis onwards.
The Government and the National Health Service are committed to ensuring that all cancer patients get access to a Holistic Needs Assessment and Personalised Care Interventions. These will ensure care focuses on what matters most to each person, whilst empowering them to self-manage where appropriate and providing a route back into the system if they notice any worrying changes or need to seek help.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent steps he has taken to secure the supply chain of (a) progesterone and (b) other hormone replacement therapy medication.
Answered by Will Quince
We are aware of an issue with Utrogestan (progesterone) 100 milligram capsules, which will be in intermittent supply until late 2023. The supplier is taking steps to increase supply and we continue to work closely with them to monitor and drive progress. In the meantime, we have issued a Serious Shortage Protocol which allows pharmacists to dispense a maximum of two months’ supply per prescription, to help support access to available stock.
There are over 70 hormone replacement therapy (HRT) products available in the United Kingdom and the vast majority are in good supply. We are regularly engaging with individual suppliers to prevent and mitigate supply issues in the short and long term. The HRT supply position has improved considerably since last Spring. Suppliers’ responses to our calls for action to boost production in response to growing demand are having an effect. For example, the introduction of a new manufacturing facility for Oestrogel has meant that this product is now readily available for patients. Only two of the 22 Serious Shortage Protocols issued since April last year remain as the supply disruptions with most products experiencing shortages have been resolved.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the adequacy of support for healthcare workers suffering from Long Covid.
Answered by Will Quince
No assessment has been made. NHS England has invested £314 million to date to provide care for people with post COVID-19 syndrome.
A range of support is available for National Health Service staff who are experiencing symptoms of post COVID-19 syndrome, which includes training and guidance for teams and leaders as well as access to occupational health and local Employee Assistance Programmes.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
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 with Cabinet colleagues of the adequacy of Government funding for research into (a) occupational disease and (b) the (i) causes and (ii) effects of Long Covid.
Answered by Will Quince
Over £50 million has already been invested in post COVID-19 syndrome research projects to improve our understanding of the diagnosis and underlying mechanisms of the disease and the effectiveness of both pharmacological and non-pharmacological therapies and interventions, as well as to evaluate clinical care.
There are no plans for an assessment of the adequacy of research funding for post COVID-19 syndrome and/or occupational disease.
The Department funds research through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). The NIHR welcomes funding applications for research into any aspect of human health, including occupational disease and post COVID-19 syndrome. It is not usual practice to ring-fence funds for particular topics or conditions.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if his Department will make more funding available to research the occupational impacts of Long Covid.
Answered by Will Quince
Over £50 million has already been invested in post COVID-19 syndrome research projects to improve our understanding of the diagnosis and underlying mechanisms of the disease and the effectiveness of both pharmacological and non-pharmacological therapies and interventions, as well as to evaluate clinical care.
There are no plans for an assessment of the adequacy of research funding for post COVID-19 syndrome and/or occupational disease.
The Department funds research through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). The NIHR welcomes funding applications for research into any aspect of human health, including occupational disease and post COVID-19 syndrome. It is not usual practice to ring-fence funds for particular topics or conditions.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the impact of ending the covid-19 (a) special leave and (b) sick pay provisions for NHS staff on 1 September 2022.
Answered by Will Quince
The Department introduced temporary non-contractual COVID-19 sickness guidance at the start of the pandemic, to ensure National Health Service staff received full pay should they be advised to self-isolate or become ill with COVID-19. As we learn to live with COVID-19, we have withdrawn this guidance. Staff who were on COVID-19 sickness pay have moved back to the normal terms and conditions (T&Cs) sickness arrangements. The NHS T&Cs pay up to six months full pay and six months half pay depending on length of service.
We have completed an equalities assessment which concluded that the withdrawal of the guidance is considered to be a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim to equalise treatment of all staff with longer-term sickness absence.
Asked by: Layla Moran (Liberal Democrat - Oxford West and Abingdon)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what funding his Department allocated for a communications campaign to promote the seasonal booster programme for the COVID-19 vaccine.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The 2022/23 campaign to promote uptake of seasonal flu and COVID-19 booster vaccinations had a media spend of £3.02 million. This was an integrated winter vaccinations campaign and so it is not possible to split out the spend by vaccine.