Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what measures of the value of life and health were included in the evidence submitted as part of the Food Standards Agency's work with the Inter-departmental Group for the Valuation of Life and Health review in 2008.

I refer my Rt. hon. Friend to the answer given on 26 June 2014, Official Report, Column 283W.

The focus of the work of the Inter-departmental Group for the Valuation of Life and Health has been methodological rather than upon specific measures of value. It has focused upon the appropriate units for the measurement of impacts on life and health risks in different circumstances, and the methodology to be applied to valuation of those units in different contexts. Nevertheless, as a spur to the methodological investigation, an initial survey of monetary valuations of various units of impact by different departments and agencies including case studies was undertaken. This was conducted by the Institute of Transport Studies at the University of Leeds and compiled into a “Survey of the Value of Life/ Health used in Government Departments”, which has been placed in the Library. In addition, the Health and Safety Executive and the Department for Transport have already placed in the Library their members' responses to the ITS survey.

Development of monetary thresholds to be applied to the cost-per-quality adjusted life year is not within the remit of the Group.