Asked by: Desmond Swayne (Conservative - New Forest West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment her Department made of the potential risks of discontinuing routine covid-19 testing of hospital patients prior to their discharge to care homes before.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The public health advice is that now is an appropriate point to end routine asymptomatic discharge testing for COVID-19, and move to a risk-based approach. A reduction in the severity of illness associated with the omicron variant, coupled with a high uptake of the vaccine among residents during the autumn COVID-19 vaccination booster, continued provision of infection prevention and control guidance, and the upcoming increased eligibility for COVID-19 treatments, demonstrates a reduced level of risk from COVID-19 in adult social care settings. In addition, epidemiological studies, and consensus reports from the early phases of the pandemic, suggest that hospital discharge was not dominant in the ingress of COVID-19 into care home settings.
The UK Health Security Agency’s (UKHSA) guidance on safe discharge and management of individuals with symptoms of an acute respiratory infection remains in place, and this will be kept under regular review. National Health Service trusts will have local discretion to re-introduce discharge or other forms of testing where clinically appropriate, following a risk assessment involving local authority public health teams, UKHSA Health Protection Teams, and care providers, as necessary in the decision making.
Asked by: Daisy Cooper (Liberal Democrat - St Albans)
Question to the HM Treasury:
To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer, what discussions his Department has had with the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on a respiratory syncytial virus vaccination programme.
Answered by Laura Trott - Chief Secretary to the Treasury
Ministers and officials across government meet regularly to discuss a wide range of issues, including routine and new vaccination programmes. If any RSV programmes are agreed to, they will be announced to the public and health professionals in due course.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government how they plan to assess the impact of new immunisation programmes for infant respiratory syncytial virus on (1) hospitalisations, and (2) health inequality.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) monitors national immunisation programmes in England. The UKHSA’s Severe Acute Respiratory Infection Watch surveillance system collects weekly information on admissions to hospital with Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV), to monitor admission rates in each RSV season. If a programme is introduced, monitoring of its effectiveness would include thorough analysis of immunisation records, both infant or maternal, and laboratory results for patients needing healthcare for RSV-like illness. The UKHSA can also monitor RSV admissions by deprivation and ethnicity, using routine National Health Service records, when these become available following the RSV season. The UKHSA will also monitor inequalities in uptake of the RSV immunisation programmes, through its routine uptake data collections.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government how they plan to assess the wider productivity and economic benefits of any new immunisation programmes for infant respiratory syncytial virus.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The independent Joint Committee for Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advises the Department on the approach to vaccination and immunisation. The JCVI’s evaluation of the cost-effectiveness of a respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) programme was based on the health benefits of an infant RSV programme, and the potential healthcare cost savings from preventing cases and hospitalisations.
The Department did not ask the JCVI to complete an assessment of the wider productivity and economic benefits when determining the cost-effectiveness of a vaccination programme, and the Department did not assess this separately for RSV.
Asked by: Paul Blomfield (Labour - Sheffield Central)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 7 December 2023 to Question 4959 on Respiratory Diseases: Health Services, how many Acute Respiratory Infection hubs were operating in winter 2023/24.
Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
During winter 2022/23, 363 Acute Respiratory Infection (ARI) hubs were implemented by integrated care systems (ICSs). The Department does not hold recorded information on the number of ARI hubs in 2023/24, as this information is held instead by local health bodies. The ambition in the recovery plan for urgent and emergency care is that each local area that would benefit from an ARI hub, has one in place ahead of winter. Evaluations from NHS England suggest that ARI hubs may save general practitioner appointments and accident and emergency attendances.
Asked by: Mark Hendrick (Labour (Co-op) - Preston)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps her Department is taking to prepare for (a) an avian influenza outbreak and (b) a future pandemic.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The Department continues to plan and prepare for a range of pandemic and emerging infectious disease scenarios, including those caused by respiratory contact, both influenza and non-influenza, and vector-borne pathogens, building on lessons learned from exercises and incidents, including the COVID-19 pandemic. The Department, working with health and care partners, is strengthening pandemic preparedness by considering the flexible and scalable response capabilities that can be adapted to any threat that the health and social care system needs.
These capabilities include stockpiles of critical medicines, an advance purchase agreement for a pandemic specific influenza vaccine, and a long-term strategic partnership with Moderna on vaccine development. These complement core scalable capabilities in the UK Health Security Agency, such as surveillance and diagnostics.
We are carefully monitoring avian influenza globally. The risk to people in the United Kingdom from avian influenza is very low. It is primarily a disease of birds and there is currently no evidence that it can spread more easily to people, or that it can spread between people. We continually review our readiness plans as new evidence emerges.
Asked by: Rachael Maskell (Labour (Co-op) - York Central)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment she has made of the preparedness of intensive care services for a future pandemic.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The Department continues to plan and prepare for a range of pandemic and emerging infectious disease scenarios, including those caused by respiratory contact, both influenza and non-influenza, and vector-borne pathogens, building on lessons learned from exercises and incidents, including the COVID-19 pandemic. The Department working with health and care partners is strengthening pandemic preparedness by considering the flexible and scalable response capabilities that can be adapted to any threat that the health and social care system needs.
This includes intensive care capacity that will continue to be an integral part of National Health Service resilience and pandemic planning. The urgent and emergency care recovery plan this year sought to strengthen capacity within the acute bed base, with 5,000 additional permanent staffed core general and acute beds delivered, compared to planned 2022/23 levels. Our preparedness also includes considering the medicines and other supporting products for intensive care services in a pandemic.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many full-time equivalent members of staff work on pandemic preparedness in (a) her Department and (b) the UK Health Security Agency.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The Government continues to plan and prepare for a range of pandemic and emerging infectious disease scenarios, including those caused by respiratory contact, both influenza and non-influenza, and vector-borne pathogens, building on lessons learned from exercises and incidents, including the COVID-19 pandemic. There are currently 21.35 full time equivalent (FTE) staff working on pandemic preparedness within the Global and Public Health Group of the Department.
Every team across the United Kingdom Health Security Agency (UKHSA) is playing a critical role in the nation’s pandemic preparedness and is committing significant resource and effort to meet our remit. As a result, it is not possible to provide an FTE figure of all staff whose work forms part of pandemic preparedness. The UKHSA’s Centre for Pandemic Preparedness (CPP) holds some members of staff who are focused primarily on pandemic preparedness policy and coordination. There currently are 18.4 FTEs working in CPP.
Asked by: Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the dangers to some users of the asthma drug montelukast; and what discussions they have had with the montelukast UK action group, which has highlighted the risks of the drug.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Montelukast remains a safe and effective medicine in the treatment of asthma. Montelukast is indicated for use in the United Kingdom as an add on treatment for asthma patients who are inadequately controlled on inhaled corticosteroid treatment, and can be prescribed for the symptomatic relief of seasonal allergic rhinitis in patients with asthma.
Neuropsychiatric effects such as depression have been included in the UK product information for montelukast since 2007. This has been subsequently updated with additional terms, based on emerging evidence. This includes the most recent update in 2019, to more fully describe the neuropsychiatric effects. In order to remind prescribers of the risk of the neuropsychiatric effects with montelukast, a Drug Safety Update article was published by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) in 2019 to accompany the updated warnings.
Following a growing number of Yellow Card reports and queries from patients and caregivers raising concerns about a potential ongoing lack of awareness of the risk of the neuropsychiatric effects with montelukast, the MHRA is conducting a further review of the latest data. As part of our review, we are evaluating all available evidence including Yellow Card reports and queries received by the MHRA, literature publications, international regulatory changes, including those made by the United States’ Food and Drug Administration, and listening to and learning from patients’ experiences.
The MHRA has sought advice from our independent expert groups including paediatricians, specialists in mental and respiratory health, as well as experts in medicines safety. Patient representatives from the UK action group, including parents of children and young people who had taken montelukast, were invited to the MHRA’s independent pharmacovigilance expert advisory group (PEAG), to share their lived experiences of dealing with the impact of the neuropsychiatric effects, including the impact of lack of awareness of the side effect. The MHRA is finalising the review process and will communicate on any further measures to minimise the risk, upon completion of our review.
Asked by: Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the level of awareness by doctors of any dangers of the commonly prescribed drug montelukast, as highlighted by the US Food and Drug Administration in March 2020, that the use of the drug resulted in “a wide variety of mental health side effects have been reported, including completed suicides".
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Montelukast remains a safe and effective medicine in the treatment of asthma. Montelukast is indicated for use in the United Kingdom as an add on treatment for asthma patients who are inadequately controlled on inhaled corticosteroid treatment, and can be prescribed for the symptomatic relief of seasonal allergic rhinitis in patients with asthma. There is no licensed indication in the UK for the treatment of allergic rhinitis alone.
Neuropsychiatric effects such as depression have been included in the UK product information for montelukast since 2007. This has been subsequently updated with additional terms based on emerging evidence. This includes the most recent update in 2019, which more fully described the neuropsychiatric effects. In order to remind prescribers of the risk of neuropsychiatric effects with montelukast, a Drug Safety Update article was published by the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) in 2019, to accompany the updated warnings.
Following a growing number of Yellow Card reports and queries from patients and caregivers, raising concerns about a potential ongoing lack of awareness of the risk of the neuropsychiatric effects with montelukast, the MHRA is conducting a further review of the current data.
As part of our review, we are evaluating all available evidence, including Yellow Card reports and queries received by the MHRA, literature publications, international regulatory changes, including those made by the United States’ Food and Drug Administration, and are listening to and learning from patients’ experiences. The MHRA has sought advice from our independent expert groups including paediatricians, specialists in mental and respiratory health, as well as experts in medicines safety.
We are considering all relevant regulatory actions that would provide the most effective way of increasing awareness to healthcare professionals, patients, and their caregivers. The MHRA is finalising the review process and will communicate on any further measures to minimise the risk, upon completion of our review.