Perinatal Mental Health

Lord Patel Excerpts

Wednesday 25th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

I do not share the view that it is discretionary funding, not least because what matters are the outputs, which are, as I described, that a record nearly 65,000 women accessed a specialist community perinatal mental health service or maternal mental health service in the 12 months to April 2025. That gives some idea of the scale—that is a 95% increase compared with four years earlier. So the output is absolutely there. Was it ever the case that all needs were met? No, it was not, even before the change to the planning guidance and the ring-fencing. I emphasise again that this Government’s whole approach is to ensure that local communities are properly served. That is why ICBs can make decisions about how they provide what I regard as first-rate services.

[Lord Patel (CB)]

My Lords, I support much of what the noble Baroness, Lady Berger, said, particularly about the leading cause of maternal deaths—39% of them—being suicide. Not only that: 37% of those mothers who took their own lives had a known history of mental health issues, yet they were not properly looked after. That is the main problem. Although guidelines exist for screening mothers during pregnancy and after the birth of a baby, they are not universally followed. There is a great variation in the adoption of these guidelines and using the screening tools that are available to identify mothers at risk during pregnancy. We need to put much more effort into that. On the cost, there is only one small model that describes the benefits of identifying mothers at risk during pregnancy and after delivery. We need a detailed study to show the cost-benefit analysis of doing that.

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

The noble Lord, building on my noble friend’s point, makes a very important point. I will add to what he said. The impact on affected families is absolutely devastating and has very long-lasting effects, particularly on children. As the noble Lord said, the suicide prevention strategy outlines what clinicians should do, which is complete screening of women’s mental health during pregnancy and the first year after pregnancy. I hear the points that the noble Lord made and will put them into my discussions about suicide prevention, because I am also concerned about the number of people who take their own lives who are in no contact with the health services; we have to find a way of making contact with them. This is less the case in this circumstance, but that theme is still there. I thank the noble Lord for that contribution.