Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what recent advice they have taken from the UK Statistics Authority on fulfilling their responsibility under the Abortion Act 1967 to produce abortion statistics.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
In accordance with the Abortion Act 1967, all abortions in England must be notified to the Chief Medical Officer within 14 days of the procedure. This information is used by the Department to monitor compliance with the act. The Department also publishes this data in line with the Code of Practice for Statistics, to ensure it is available to commissioners and providers of abortion services and others with an interest in abortion in England and Wales. There is no legal duty placed on the Department to publish data collected through abortion notification forms.
The Department regularly consults the Office for Statistics Regulation, which is the independent regulatory arm of the UK Statistics Authority, and provides independent regulation of all official statistics produced in the United Kingdom.
Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether the medical assessors for the Vaccine Damages Payment Scheme have access to the scientific advice given to ministers regarding the AstraZeneca Covid-19 Vaccine.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
All claims to the Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme (VDPS) are assessed on a case-by-case basis by experienced independent medical assessors, General Medical Council registered doctors with a licence to practise, who have undertaken specialised training in vaccine damage and disability assessment.
When making medical assessment through the VDPS, independent medical assessors consider not just the claimant’s full medical records once they are gathered, but also the claim form and a range of credible resources to support their assessment, as per NHS Business Services Authority’s published VDPS Principles of Medical Assessment. This includes, but is not limited to, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency’s data, including Yellow Card information on suspected safety concerns involving a healthcare product, vaccine product information and updates, the UK Health Security Agency's Green Book, and the World Health Organization’s Causality assessment of an adverse event following immunization. Medical assessors will also consider academic research, epidemiological evidence, and the current consensus of expert medical opinion.
Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many cases of Guillain-Barré syndrome have been recorded in each of the last ten years.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The information is not held in the format requested. However, the following table shows a count of the Finished Admission Episodes (FAEs) where the primary diagnosis was Guillain-Barré syndrome, for the period 2014/15 to 2023/24 in England:
Year | FAEs |
2014/15 | 1,403 |
2015/16 | 1,354 |
2016/17 | 1,412 |
2017/18 | 1,342 |
2018/19 | 1,337 |
2019/20 | 1,354 |
2020/21 | 921 |
2021/22 | 1,243 |
2022/23 | 1,374 |
2023/24 | 1,367 |
Source: data is from the Hospital Episode Statistics, by NHS England.
Notes:
Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will publish the scientific advice they received from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation between 1 April and 6 May 2021 regarding age restrictions for the AstraZeneca COVID-19 Vaccine.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) provided advice to the Government between 1 April and 6 May 2021 regarding age restrictions for the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine. This advice was published on the GOV.UK website, and states that the JCVI currently advises that it is preferable for adults aged less than 30 years old, without underlying health conditions that put them at higher risk of severe COVID-19 disease, to be offered an alternative COVID-19 vaccine, if available.
Discussions on the AstraZeneca vaccine also took place and are noted within the minutes of the JCVI’s COVID-19 sub-committee meetings held on 13, 22, and 29 April 2021. The outcome of the discussions held within these meetings was reflected in the updated JCVI advice on the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine, published on the 7 May 2021, which extended the preferential use of alternative vaccines to unvaccinated adults aged 30 to 39 years old, who are not in a clinical priority group at higher risk of severe COVID-19 disease.
Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government how many applicants to the Vaccine Damages Payment Scheme (VDPS) have made a claim relating to the AstraZeneca Covid-19 Vaccine; and how many applicants to the VDPS have been waiting for a decision for longer than (1) one year and (2) 18 months.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
As of 30 September 2024, the Vaccine Damage Payment Scheme (VDPS) has processed 3,825 claims relating to the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine. A further 207 claims relating to the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine are undergoing medical assessment. As of 30 September 2024, there were 7,335 live VDPS claims, of which 1,024 have been awaiting resolution for longer than 12 months, and 316 claims for longer than 18 months.
Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government when they received scientific advice detailing an increase in the incidence of autoimmune illness and a possible link between that increase and the AstraZeneca COVID-19 Vaccine.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Following reports of extremely rare adverse events of concurrent thrombosis and thrombocytopenia following vaccination with the first dose of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advised that adults aged under 30 years old and without underlying health conditions should be offered an alternative vaccine, if available. This advice was published on 7 April 2021. In parallel, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency updated its information for healthcare professionals on the COVID-19 AstraZeneca vaccine. On 7 May 2021, the JCVI published updated advice which extended the group who should be offered an alternative to include all unvaccinated adults aged 30 to 39 years old who were not in a clinical priority group at higher risk of severe COVID-19 disease. This advice is published online, and is available in an online only format.
Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what scientific advice they received between 1 April and 6 May 2021 regarding age restrictions for the AstraZeneca COVID-19 Vaccine.
Answered by Baroness Merron - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Following reports of extremely rare adverse events of concurrent thrombosis and thrombocytopenia following vaccination with the first dose of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advised that adults aged under 30 years old and without underlying health conditions should be offered an alternative vaccine, if available. This advice was published on 7 April 2021. In parallel, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency updated its information for healthcare professionals on the COVID-19 AstraZeneca vaccine. On 7 May 2021, the JCVI published updated advice which extended the group who should be offered an alternative to include all unvaccinated adults aged 30 to 39 years old who were not in a clinical priority group at higher risk of severe COVID-19 disease. This advice is published online, and is available in an online only format.
Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they will request NHS England to permit the prescription of Thiamine capsules as an alternative to tablets.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
Clinicians are responsible for making prescribing decisions for their patients, considering best prescribing practice and appropriate national and local guidance.
In respect of the prescribing of unlicensed medicines, the National Health Service’s long-established practice is reflected in professional guidance. Individual patient needs should be fulfilled by, firstly, using a licensed medicine within its licensed indication, or if there is nothing suitable, using a licensed medicine outside its licensed indication. If there is still nothing suitable after this, the clinician can consider using an unlicensed medicine.
Thiamine tablets are available as a licensed medicine. Thiamine capsules are not a licensed medicine. Thiamine supplements can be purchased from pharmacies or shops. These include vitamin B complex tablets and multivitamin tablets where thiamine is listed as an ingredient. NHS guidance states that vitamins and minerals should not be routinely prescribed in primary care as there is insufficient high-quality evidence to demonstrate their clinical effectiveness. However, subject to funding, a clinician can prescribe any product on the NHS that they consider to be clinically necessary for the treatment of their patient unless it is listed in Schedules 1 or 2 of the NHS (General Medical Services Contracts) (Prescription of Drugs etc.) Regulations 2004. Parts XVIIIA and XVIIIB of the NHS Drug Tariff list the drugs, medicines and other substance that may not be ordered, or may only be ordered on the NHS in certain circumstances under the above regulations.
Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to ensure the "special status” of the human embryo continues to be upheld in any decisions related to human embryo research; and whether they will make an assessment of the recent Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority consultation, in particular given that it omitted any mention of the protected “special status” of the embryo or any related ethical considerations.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) has advised that any decisions related to human embryo research are undertaken in accordance with the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act 1990 (as amended). The Government asked the HFEA to undertake a stakeholder dialogue to identify priorities for modernisation of the Act in 2021, and the report of this work is not expected to be completed until autumn 2023.
Asked by: Lord Moylan (Conservative - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government whether they intend to review the safety of abortion pills being sent by post.
Answered by Lord Markham - Shadow Minister (Science, Innovation and Technology)
The Government has no current plans to commission a review into the practice of sending pills for women to carry out early medical abortion at home.