Health: Red Cell Folate

Lord Hughes of Woodside Excerpts

Tuesday 19th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Prior of Brampton]

My Lords, I think we are still quite early in the new year. I do not go back to 1991 but the noble Baroness is right: for many years now there has been a large body of scientific opinion in favour of increasing the uptake of folic acid. There is no dispute about that—I do not think there is much science to dispute. The issue is one of balancing the scientific and medical arguments with issues around choice and whether or not it is right to medicate the entire population for the benefit of a fairly small part of it.

[Lord Hughes of Woodside (Lab)]

My Lords, when the Minister says that other views have been taken into account, will he lay to rest today and for ever the idea that the Government will be swayed by those who say, spuriously and nonsensically, that this is mass medication?

[Lord Prior of Brampton]

The proposal is that bread should be fortified with folic acid. The point of doing it through bread is that most people eat bread and that it would reach the widest number of people. It would be fortifying a product that most people eat; that is the purpose of it.