Folic Acid

Baroness Altmann Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd March 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

The noble Baroness puts the case well. It is an issue that I feel personally committed to; a cousin of mine was born with a neural tube defect many years ago, and the effects of that hit my family extremely hard. I recognise the problem of unplanned pregnancies and the need to find a way to get folic acid to people who were perhaps not intending to have a pregnancy. We take this matter extremely seriously, and I commit to returning to the House when we have an update on it.

[Baroness Altmann (Con)]

I encourage my noble friend to accelerate this initiative of folic acid supplementation, which the House can see clearly he would very much welcome. But can he also comment on other preventive measures to improve the nation’s wider health?

[Lord Bethell (Con)]

My Lords, I think my noble friend alludes to the rollout of the vaccine, which has been the consummate preventive medicine programme that the country has ever seen. It is, I hope, an inflection point in the whole country’s approach to its healthcare. We have for too long emphasised late-stage, heavy- duty interventions, and we have not focused enough on preventive early-stage interventions. Folic acid is a really good example, as are the vaccine and fluoridation, and the kinds of population health measures we hope to bring in will address all of those.