Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer given on 20 December 2022 to Question 109778, on Hormone Replacement Therapy, if he will make an assessment of the potential impact of the use of such alternative products on the health of patients.

Serious Shortage Protocols (SSPs) are a tool that has been in place for many years to manage and mitigate medicine and medical devices shortages and pharmacists will be familiar with the process.

The Department has sought clinical advice for these SSPs from national experts including clinicians from the British Menopause Society and the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, who are supportive of this management option. The SSPs were clinically checked by expert clinicians and signed off by senior clinicians at NHS England before being published. The substituted products that have been included in the SSPs are all licensed medicines that are considered clinically appropriate products by clinicians.

17 SSP’s for hormone replacement therapy products have been issued since April 2022. Most have been withdrawn as the supply position of products affected by short term supply issues have resolved. Five SSPs currently remain in place.