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 availability and quality of data held by Integrated Care Boards on the prevalence of clinically diagnosed allergic conditions and the specialist allergy workforce in their local areas; and what consideration has he given to the potential merits of establishing a National Allergy Register, embedded within the planned Single Patient Record in improving patient safety and reducing regional inequalities in allergy care.

In conducting health needs assessments to inform their commissioning decisions, integrated care boards (ICBs) will have access to a wide range of data sources, including public health data, hospital statistics, primary care data, and social care metrics.

NHS England is working with the UK Fatal Anaphylaxis Register (UKFAR) to develop a mechanism for sharing relevant patient safety anaphylaxis incidents, including the reporting of anaphylaxis in hospitals. The aim will be for the UKFAR to extract and share patient safety incidents reported to the national databases, the National Reporting and Learning System and Learn from Patient Safety Events, relating to severe allergic reactions. Work has been progressing on this.

The National Allergy Strategy Group, an external group of stakeholders, is developing a UK National Allergy Strategy 2025-2035. The Department will carefully consider and respond to it when we receive it next year.