Asked by: Marquess of Lothian (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the statement by the Royal College of Psychiatrists on 2 March that the NHS is "facing an eating disorders crisis", due to a 51 per cent increase in children and young people requiring specialist services; and what steps they will take to ensure that there is no regional disparity in the services offered.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Under the NHS Long Term Plan, the Government has earmarked additional funding to bolster existing mental health services, including eating disorder services, until 2023/24. Since 2016, investment in children and young people's community eating disorder services has risen every year, with an extra £54 million per year from 2023/24. This extra funding continues to enhance the capacity of community eating disorder teams across the country. We expect integrated care boards to continue to meet the Mental Health Investment Standard so that investment in mental health services increases in line with their overall increase in allocation for that year.
NHS England continues to work with system leaders and regions and to ask that areas prioritise service delivery and investment to meet the needs of these vulnerable young people to help ensure funding flows to these services as intended. To support this, NHS England is refreshing guidance on children and young people's eating disorders, including to increase the focus on early identification and intervention. The updated guidance will highlight the importance of improved integration between dedicated community eating disorder services, wider children and young people's mental health services, schools, colleges, and primary care to improve awareness, provide expert advice and improve support for children and young people presenting with problems with eating, whilst ensuring swift access to specialist support as soon as an eating disorder is suspected.
Asked by: Paula Barker (Labour - Liverpool, Wavertree)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent steps his Department has taken to provide funding for mental health services for people under the age of 18.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
It is the responsibility of integrated care boards (ICBs) to make available appropriate provision to meet the health and care needs of their local population, and we are supporting them to expand mental health services through the NHS Long Term Plan, which commits to increasing investment into mental health services by at least £2.3 billion a year by 2023/24 so that an additional two million are able to access National Health Service funded mental health support.
The spend for children and young people’s mental health services has increased from £841.4 million in 2019/20 to £994.8 million 2021/22, with a planned spend of £1.0815 billion in 2022/23. This funding is across both NHS specialised commissioning which includes eating disorders services and local commissioning. The source of this data is from the NHS England dashboard. Previous and most recent NHS mental health dashboards is available at the following link:
www.england.nhs.uk/publication/nhs-mental-health-dashboard
Asked by: David Warburton (Independent - Somerton and Frome)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to help support parents of children with severe mental health conditions.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
We would expect that children and young people’s mental health services would routinely involve parents, carers and families in the care of children and young people with severe mental health conditions as appropriate. The Mental Health Act code of practice states that mental health providers should make efforts to support parents of children who are detained under the Mental Health Act 1983.
Our planned reforms to the Mental Health Act will help better ensure that parents are more closely involved in care planning and treatment decisions if their child is detained under the Mental Health Act, with the aim that this facilitates more trusting relationships with the clinical teams and better outcomes for the child.
Additionally, NHS England provides a MindEd portal which has specific content directed at parents, which is available at the following link:
https://www.mindedforfamilies.org.uk/
NHS England has published information for parents and carers of children in contact with children and young people’s mental health services, available at the following link:
The webpage contains information about where to seek advice and support for coping with anything affecting the child’s mental health or wellbeing. It also includes a link to the Royal College of Psychiatrists’ (RCPsych) advice leaflets for parents and carers about a wide range of mental health conditions, including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and eating disorders. RCPsych’s advice can be found at the following link:
www.rcpsych.ac.uk/mental-health/parents-and-young-people.
YoungMinds and other mental health charities have produced extensive resources and support for parents.
Asked by: Lord Weir of Ballyholme (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Science, Innovation & Technology:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to protect (1) children, and (2) vulnerable adults, from online encouragement to pursue behaviours that may lead to eating disorders.
Answered by Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Culture, Media and Sport)
Under the Online Safety Bill, companies which run websites which are likely to be accessed by children will need to take steps to prevent their child users from encountering self-harm and eating disorder content. All in-scope services will also need to address any other content (“non-designated content”) which risks causing significant harm to an appreciable number of children.
The largest services will also need to enforce their own terms and conditions, which often prohibit such content, and offer all adult users tools to give them greater control over the content they see. These tools will apply to content which encourages, promotes, or provides instructions for an eating disorder or behaviours associated therewith, and will reduce the likelihood that users who do not wish to encounter this content will do so.
The Government has also committed to introduce a new communications offence of intentionally encouraging or assisting serious self-harm, including eating disorders, where it meets the criminal threshold. Once introduced, companies will need to treat this content as illegal under the framework of the Bill, taking steps to remove this content once they become aware of it.
Asked by: Lord Weir of Ballyholme (Democratic Unionist Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government how much funding they have committed to child mental health services in the current financial year; and how much funding they provided in each of the last three years.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The following table shows information about funding for children and young people’s mental health services for 2019/20 to 2021/22. The last three years for which complete information is available can be found at the NHS mental health dashboard in an online only format. Also included is planned spend for 2022/23, according to the quarter two, 2022/23 National Health Service mental health dashboard.
Year | Mental Health clinical commissioning group spend - excluding learning disabilities and eating disorders (£ million) | Mental Health clinical commissioning group spend - eating disorders (£ million) | Total spend (£ million) |
2019/20 | 791.4 | 50.0 | 841.4 |
2020/21 | 880.8 | 57.5 | 938.3 |
2021/22 | 922.0 | 72.8 | 994.8 |
2022/23 (planned) | 998.0 | 83.5 | 1,081.5 |
Source: NHS England
Asked by: Christopher Pincher (Independent - Tamworth)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the extent of the awareness of men's eating disorders; and if he will take steps to improve awareness of the support available.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
We are aware of the research carried out by the eating disorder charity Beat which estimates that one in four people living with an eating disorder in the United Kingdom are thought to be male, and the majority of those who took part in that research felt that raising awareness would help more men to get treatment sooner.
Eating disorders are serious, life-threatening conditions that can affect people of any age, gender, ethnicity or background. We know that people with eating disorders can face stigma around their disorder, which can stop them from reaching out for help and support. To support early identification, the Government recognises that raising awareness and reducing the stigma associated with eating disorders and other mental health conditions is paramount. It is good to see Parliamentarians playing an important part in raising awareness of eating disorders in men through the debates and questions in both Houses this week, which is National Eating Disorders week.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of taking steps to improve training on eating disorders for GPs.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
NHS England is working with Health Education England (HEE) to increase access to quality training on eating disorders in primary care. HEE has developed training for primary care staff and others who encounter people with an eating disorder. General Practitioners are responsible for ensuring their own clinical knowledge, including eating disorders, remains up-to-date and for identifying learning needs as part of their continuing professional development. This activity should include taking account of new research and developments in guidance, such as that produced by National Institute for Health and Care Excellence, to ensure that they can continue to provide high quality care to all patients.
In addition, we know that the General Medical Council (GMC) has taken steps to ensure newly qualified doctors must illustrate safe management of patients with eating disorders. The GMC has also been working with stakeholders to improve recognition and treatment of eating disorders including by commissioning the Academy of Royal Colleges to work with medical colleges on curricula content.
Asked by: Rosena Allin-Khan (Labour - Tooting)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many adult eating disorder beds there were in the NHS in each year since 2010.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The following table shows the number of National Health Service commissioned inpatient beds for adult eating disorder services. Bed numbers can vary throughout the year as units close and new ones open. These figures are therefore the average number of beds across the year. Bed numbers for adult inpatient eating disorder beds for 2022/23 are based on the last validated data in 2021/22. The data provided is held within internal data management systems and not available publicly. NHS England does not hold reliable data for 2016 and prior.
Service | Adult eating disorder |
2017/18 | 397 |
2018/19 | 388 |
2019/20 | 400 |
2020/21 | 400 |
2021/22 | 400 |
2022/23 | 400 |
Asked by: Kim Leadbeater (Labour - Batley and Spen)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he has taken to reduce the potential impact of publishing calorific content on menus on people with eating disorders.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
I refer the hon. Member to the answer given to the hon. Member for Coventry South on 25 October 2022 to Question 64353.
Asked by: Andrew Gwynne (Labour - Denton and Reddish)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent estimate he has made of the number of children being admitted to A&E with an (a) primary and (b) secondary diagnosis of malnutrition per (i) month and (ii) year.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
NHS Digital has provided a count of Emergency Care Data Set attendances where a primary or secondary diagnosis of malnutrition was recorded and the patient was aged under 0-17 years old, for each month between April 2021 and November 2022 in England. This information is provided in the table below.
Activity in English NHS Hospitals and English NHS commissioned activity in the independent sector | ||||
Year | Month | Primary diagnosis | Secondary Only | All diagnosis |
2021 | April | 12 | 7 | 19 |
2021 | May | 28 | 2 | 30 |
2021 | June | 20 | 8 | 28 |
2021 | July | 21 | 2 | 23 |
2021 | August | 29 | 10 | 39 |
2021 | September | 25 | 5 | 30 |
2021 | October | 25 | 2 | 27 |
2021 | November | 20 | 7 | 27 |
2021 | December | 22 | 1 | 23 |
2022 | January | 15 | 3 | 18 |
2022 | February | 17 | 4 | 21 |
2022 | March | 16 | 4 | 20 |
2022* | April | 27 | 2 | 29 |
2022* | May | 29 | 6 | 35 |
2022* | June | 19 | 4 | 23 |
2022* | July | 22 | 1 | 23 |
2022* | August | 19 | 2 | 21 |
2022* | September | 13 | 2 | 15 |
2022* | October | 19 | 1 | 20 |
2022* | November | 26 | 7 | 33 |
Source: Emergency Care Data Set (ECDS), NHS Digital
(* provisional data)
Some health conditions can lead to malnutrition in some children. This includes eating disorders, although malnutrition itself is not an eating disorder. Through the NHS Long-Term Plan, investment in children and young people's community eating disorder services has risen every year since 2016, with an extra £54 million per year from 2022/23. This extra funding will enhance the capacity of children and young people's community eating disorder teams across the country.