Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how much personal protective equipment (PPE) the Government has purchased that has not been used as a result of being (a) unwanted and (b) unusable since 1 January 2020; what the total cost is of that PPE; and what the daily cost is of storing that PPE.
Answered by Edward Argar
The personal protective equipment (PPE) programme has ordered over 36.4 billion items since March 2020. Of this, approximately 3.4 billion units are currently identified as potential excess stock. The estimated purchase price for those items is £2.2 billion.
In addition, a total of 6.96 billion items are not currently provided to frontline services. This can be for a variety of reasons, including new stock that has not yet cleared assurance processes or where a different product is preferred. Of these, 1.2 billion items are deemed to be not fit for use. The purchase price for these items was £458 million. Data on the specific storage costs is not held in the format requested. However, on 13 December 2021 weekly storage costs for all stock was £4.5 million.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will publish the Government's criteria by which countries are placed on the red list for covid-19 travel restrictions.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) produces risk assessments in order to inform Ministerial decisions on border measures, including the addition of countries to the ‘red list’. These risk assessments review a range of factors for each country, including assessment of surveillance and sequencing capability, available surveillance and genome sequencing data, evidence of in-country community transmission of COVID-19 variants, evidence of exportation of new variants to the United Kingdom or other countries and travel connectivity with the UK.
Information on the UKHSA’s methodology is published alongside key summary data which is available at the following link:
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will publish any equality impact assessments conducted in the process of placing countries on the red list.
Answered by Maggie Throup
We are unable to provide the information requested as it relates to the formulation or development of ongoing Government policy.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what guidance his Department has issued to Ambulance Services on prioritising call outs; and on what basis the priority of call outs is determined.
Answered by Edward Argar
The Department has issued no such guidance. The prioritisation of responses to 999 calls is an operational matter for National Health Service ambulance services. The following table shows the ambulance service’s categories for evaluating 999 incidents, with corresponding response time standards.
Category | Headline description | Sub description | Mean response time standard | 90th percentile response time standard |
1 | Life Threatening | A time critical life-threatening event requiring immediate intervention or resuscitation. | 7 minutes | 15 minutes |
2 | Emergency | Potentially serious conditions that may require rapid assessment and urgent on-scene intervention and/or urgent transport. | 18 minutes | 40 minutes |
3 | Urgent | An urgent problem (not immediately life threatening) that needs treatment to relieve suffering and transport or assessment and management at the scene with referral where needed within a clinically appropriate timeframe. | None | 2 hours |
4 | Less-Urgent | Problems that are less urgent but require assessment and possibly transport within a clinically appropriate timeframe. | None | 3 hours |
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
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 improve the quality of life for those suffering with Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
In 2019/20, NHS England and NHS Improvement funded a pilot project to improve access, assessment and treatment for children presenting with Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder (ARFID). Learning from this pilot has been disseminated to community eating disorder teams in England.
In 2020, NHS England and NHS Improvement commissioned the research charity Autistica to produce an ‘ARFID and Autistic People’ briefing paper, based on a systematic review of research literature. This informed two awareness raising webinars for staff from the eating disorders charity BEAT and commissioners, clinicians and providers, to consider how autistic children and young people with ARFID could benefit from eating disorder support and services.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what monitoring his Department undertakes on demand for treatment for avoidant restrictive food intake disorder.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
We have established the first waiting time standard to improve access to treatment for children and young people in need of eating disorder treatment in England, including avoidant restrictive food intake disorder, to allow 95% to start treatment within one week if urgent and within four weeks if routine. However, it is not possible to separately identify the different types of eating disorders within this data.
Data on waiting times and demand for adult eating disorder services is not currently collected centrally.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether his Department monitors waiting times for treatment for Avoidant Restrictive Food Intake Disorder.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
We have established the first waiting time standard to improve access to treatment for children and young people in need of eating disorder treatment in England, including avoidant restrictive food intake disorder, to allow 95% to start treatment within one week if urgent and within four weeks if routine. However, it is not possible to separately identify the different types of eating disorders within this data.
Data on waiting times and demand for adult eating disorder services is not currently collected centrally.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent estimate his Department has made of the number of people waiting for treatment for avoidant restrictive food intake disorder.
Answered by Gillian Keegan
No specific estimate has been made.
Asked by: Wendy Chamberlain (Liberal Democrat - North East Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what his Department's policy is on the use of the hormone PMSG in medication.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
Pregnant mare’s serum gonadotropin which is also referred to as equine chorionic gonadotropin (PMSG or eCG), is not used in any medicinal products in the United Kingdom. As such, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency do not have a specific policy on PMSG and would assess any authorisation requests for a medicine or products that contain PMSG on a case by case basis.
PMSG may be used in livestock management, which falls under the remit of the Veterinary Medicines Directorate.