Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the HCVAction report Taking the initiative: how England is eliminating Hepatitis C, published on 21 February, what assessment they have made of (1) the effectiveness of peer-to-peer support workers and volunteers with lived experience in combating Hepatitis C, and (2) the lessons for the other areas of healthcare from the Hepatitis C peer programme.

Peer programmes are a well embedded and demonstrably effective part of NHS England’s Hepatitis C (HCV) Elimination Programme. Almost every elimination initiative that NHS England manages and commissions HCV Operational Delivery Networks to provide, at local and sub-regional levels, has peer involvement. NHS England consistently finds that people with lived experience are excellent advocates and are crucial in developing therapeutic alliances to support people into testing and treatment who may have felt excluded from traditional healthcare and other settings.

The Government will continue to review opportunities for using peer-to-peer support workers and volunteers with lived experience to support other areas of healthcare.