Eating Disorders Awareness Week

Valerie Vaz Excerpts

Thursday 26th February 2026 Westminster Hall

[Valerie Vaz (in the Chair)]

Order. If anyone requires any assistance during the course of this debate, please see the Doorkeeper.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

It is, as always, a special pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Vaz. You always seem to do the Thursday afternoon debates and, by and large, I seem to be here too—but that is by the way. Some might say, “Well, where else would you find him?” But there we are.

It is a real pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse). In the time the hon. Lady has been here, she has been very much a hard advocate on this issue. Every one of us recognises her commitment and leadership on this matter. I put on the record my thanks to her for what she has done, what she continues to do and, indeed, if God spares her, what she will do in the future as well. It is really important.

[Valerie Vaz (in the Chair)]

Order. Can I ask the hon. Gentleman to speak up a little? I think people in the Public Gallery cannot really hear.

[Jim Shannon]

Of course. I do not think I need to do the introduction again; I will leave it at that.

I want to tell a story—the hon. Member for Bath already knows it—about one of my constituents. I was elected in 2010, and in 2012 two of my constituents, a mum and a dad, came to see me about their daughter. They were both police officers and I knew them extremely well; I knew them through a friendship we had outside the police, but also because they were officers I would contact as an elected representative. Their daughter— I am not going to mention her name, nor theirs—had severe bulimia. She was a lovely looking young girl, by the way, and very bright, but she had a real problem.

This is the true story of that family’s journey. They came to me worried sick about what was going to happen with their daughter, what they could do and what could be done. Along with them, I approached the Health Minister in Northern Ireland at that time—Edwin Poots, my party colleague—and told him the story. We did not have anything in Northern Ireland to address issues relating to eating disorders, so we had to come here to do that. I remember meeting the parents in Central Lobby in 2012, and them telling me that the Minister in Northern Ireland, Edwin Poots, had been able to transfer that young lady to St Thomas’ hospital—just across the river—to get the help that that young lady needed.

It is a transformational story, because by doing that, they saved that young girl’s life—and they did not just save her life. I know her well. One day, I was canvassing down in Millisle at the edge of my constituency. I knocked on the door and there she was, with two young children. That intervention by the Health Minister in Northern Ireland helped to save her life and to give her a life for the future. It is an example of what can be done if everyone works together to ensure that things go the right way. I will also say unashamedly that, while it was down to the NHS intervention, the prayers of God’s people undoubtedly saved that young girl’s life as well.

I want to discuss the situation in Northern Ireland. I gave that example because it shows how we worked in Northern Ireland and with the health service here to give that young lady the support to start her life, which ultimately led to her husband and then her children. Official figures show that people referred for eating disorder support in some areas face significant waiting times, with people experiencing delays as part of broader pressures on mental health services.

The hon. Member for Bath referred in her speech to mental health issues; those are some of the things we have to try to overcome collectively. In addition, mental health waiting times have been deemed unacceptable, and there has been a failure to publish comprehensive waiting-time data. I do not think there are many debates where the issue of data is as important as it is in health. The data tells us the direction we need to go in and gives us the evidence to put together a programme of response, and to find a better way of doing things. There has been a failure to publish waiting time data for child and adolescent mental health services, which is critical in supporting young people—more often than not, it is young people who suffer.

I also want to raise the impact of social media on people who suffer with eating disorders. In the last year we have seen a drastic rise in advertising related to weight-loss jabs. It is fair to say that they are easy to get and use, they are somewhat affordable, and they offer a quick fix or change. Although the premise of weight-loss injections is good, and the intention is to get people to a healthy weight, for those with eating disorders they have the potential to undermine awareness of healthy nutrition, exercise and mental health support. It is important that they are not seen as another way to try to get that perfect body, if I can use that terminology.

Social media can be toxic enough, and I worry very much about the young girl who is struggling with the likes of anorexia or bulimia, who idolises the “perfect body” achieved through weight jabs and so on, and who almost dies trying to get there. Is there any control over who can access weight-loss jobs? Can we get a better idea of their intentions, or of some of their problems? Many advertisements do not adequately convey the medical risks, the contradictions or the need for supervision, leaving vulnerable users to try treatments unsafely. Those with eating disorders may misinterpret ads as offering a safe method to lose weight quite quickly, thereby increasing the risk of physical and mental health complications.

Eating Disorders Awareness Week, which the hon. Member for Bath has kindly given us the chance to participate in with this debate, reminds us that behind every statistic is a person. I gave the example of the young person I knew, and their success story; there are many other successes, but sometimes, with sadness, we recall those people who do not make it. In Northern Ireland, long waiting times, limited specialist services and rising demand mean that too many people are not getting help when they need it most. At the same time, toxic social media content and the relentless pressure to conform to unrealistic body ideals are fuelling anxiety, low self-esteem and harmful behaviours, particularly among young people.

Throughout the time I have got to know him, the Minister has always been very responsive to our requests in these debates. There is a lot of pressure across all of the United Kingdom in respect of anorexia and bulimia. Has the Minister had a chance, in the short time he has been in post, to have a discussion with the Health Minister back in Northern Ireland, Mike Nesbitt, about how we can better work together to try to address these issues? I am conscious that most of the treatment probably happens here; some of it can be done in Northern Ireland, but services there cannot catch and keep up with the level of problems. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s commitment to ensuring that those who are struggling can access the support they need, both here and further afield in my own Northern Ireland.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Vaz. I congratulate the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) on securing this important debate and on her work in this area.

Eating disorders are deeply complex conditions. On the surface, disordered eating can take a variety of forms, including restricting the amount or the type of food eaten; binge eating large amounts of food in a short period and then purging that food through forced vomiting; excessive exercise; and laxative misuse to avoid weight gain. Beneath that surface lay a horde of drivers, such as control, shame, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, poor body image, and mysophobia, which is also known as germophobia.

The covid pandemic provoked intense scrutiny of germs and cleanliness, took away people’s control over when they could go out and when they could see their friends, and drove their activities from the personal to the online, so it comes as no surprise that it saw a spike in eating disorder referrals. By early 2021-22, 3,400 people were treated for an eating disorder, compared with 1,900 in the same period in 2019-20.

The last Government introduced the mental health investment standard to increase mental health spending in local health systems, and it also included a pledge to increase mental health spending as a proportion of total health spending every year. With mental health accounting for over 20% of demand for health services, and a 2021 report finding that eating disorders cost the UK economy a £9.4 billion per year—

[Valerie Vaz (in the Chair)]

Can I ask you to speak up, please? People in the Gallery cannot hear.

[Dr Johnson]

I am sorry.

The last Government’s work to channel more resources into mental health could not have been more welcome. This year, 2025-26, will be the first since 2016-17 that mental health spending has not risen as a proportion of health spending. That contravention of the mental health investment standard has raised alarm bells at the Health and Social Care Committee. Can the Minister enlighten us as to why the Government have decided to break the mental health investment standard after nearly a decade of progress? Does he think the percentage is now about right? Does it concern him that some ICBs have cut funding for mental health services? How does he expect that to impact on patients suffering from eating disorders?

I am particularly concerned about the impact on children and young people, and I declare an interest as a consultant NHS paediatrician. Some 6.4% of adults have a diagnosed eating disorder, but 12.5% of 17 to 19-year-olds have been diagnosed with an eating disorder since 2023. That amounts to one in five girls in that age group—four times the prevalence in boys. What specific action is the Minister taking to improve early intervention?

The previous Government got the ball rolling on establishing mental health support teams in schools, and had reached 35% coverage by the time of the general election, with a commitment to increase that to 100% of schools and colleges in England by 2030. Does the Minister plan to build on that work? What further action is he taking to improve links between eating disorder services, schools and families to ensure a joined-up approach to accessing specialist help and early diagnosis, which, as we have heard, is critical?

The hon. Member for Didcot and Wantage (Olly Glover) spoke of the challenges of transition. As a paediatrician, I see the challenges of transitioning many paediatric and adolescent conditions between children’s and adult services, but can the Minister say what he is doing specifically for those transitioning with eating disorders?

In my role as chair of the APPG on emerging drugs and online behavioural trends, I know the effect of social media on children’s and young people’s behaviours. Researchers from University College London, who examined evidence from 50 studies in 17 countries, found that social media usage is linked to eating disorders in young people, as it viciously promotes the idea that it is essential to be thin and fit, triggering a potentially extreme preoccupation with body image, weight and shape. Those obsessions are compounded by AI content, which can depict simply unachievable so-called perfection. As the hon. Member for Bath said, there are harmful videos online, with algorithms driving that harm, and those who look at these things seeing them more and more.

I recently held a policy debating competition among year 10 and year 12 students in my constituency, where students chose the topic of debate. Many of them spoke in favour of a social media ban for children as young as 16. It is a difficult issue, and that is not a perfect solution, but having just got a new mobile phone myself, I wonder why, when someone buys a phone, it cannot be set at a fixed age that can be changed only by the adult who pays the bill. A change in the law to restrict social media for under-16s would help to reduce that problem. I am interested in the Minister’s thoughts on that.

NHS guidance on eating disorders for ICBs has been raised in the debate. The NHS has refreshed that guidance, which is welcome, but patients will feel the difference only if it is actually implemented. The Minister has confirmed that there will not be a dedicated strategy for eating disorders, and there is no mention at all of eating disorders in the 70,000-word 10-year plan. Is the Minister confident that the refreshed guidance for ICBs will be sufficient on its own to improve care for people with eating disorders and to get waiting lists down? Does he have a strategy for how it will be enforced?

We have talked about the effects on families and carers. What action is the Minister taking to engage families, carers and supportive charities in plans for care? What support is available for parents, carers and siblings?

Workforce is key to delivering this strategy. We know that waiting times for eating disorder treatment are getting worse; analysis from Beat found that, in some cases, people with eating disorders face a three-and-a-half-year delay between falling ill and starting treatment. For someone with an eating disorder, that is three and a half years deeper into the illness. As we have heard, that makes it all the more difficult to treat the patient effectively and quickly pull them out of that difficult, dark place. What steps is the Minister taking to increase workforce capacity to help treat these patients and restore some stability and normality to their lives? I feel as though I ask this question every time, but the NHS long-term workforce plan is still not with us, having been delayed from last year, so when will it be published, and what tangible action will it take to boost the NHS eating disorders service?

It is not just about hiring more staff; it is also about where we are hiring them. That is important work, but more needs to be done to build on the progress. The Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership produced a highly detailed report about in-patient eating disorder service provision in the UK. As expected, there were blackspots for those vital services in many rural and coastal areas, such as in Lincolnshire. For adults and families in constituencies such as mine, where the closest service may be an hour’s car journey away, accessing eating disorder services is remarkably difficult. The Government have been insistent that rural and coastal areas will not be left behind on healthcare, but the blackspots tell us otherwise.