NHS: Patients with Allergies

Baroness Burt of Solihull Excerpts

Thursday 12th December 2024 Grand Committee

[Baroness Burt of Solihull (LD)]

My Lords, I congratulate—with my horrible squeaky voice—the noble Baroness, Lady Ramsey, on securing this debate today. My concern is not so much adolescents as children.

In my hotel room this week, I was interested to find a card explaining what to do in the case of anaphylactic shock. This suggests to me that the concern about, and the volume of cases of, serious reactions to allergies is on the up, as well as the seriousness with which the hotel group took its responsibility towards its guests. Indeed, that is borne out by the facts: an estimated 21 million people—just under one in three of us in the UK—live with one or more allergies. For most of us, this can be managed and is not severe, but for some it can be life-threatening, as the noble Baroness has said. In the UK, between 1998 and 2018, more than 100,000 people were admitted to hospital for anaphylaxis, a life-threatening allergic reaction. While the number of hospital admissions has increased in recent years, the number of deaths, I am glad to say, has decreased.

Allergy UK advocates three policies to improve NHS services for people who suffer from allergic reactions. The first is to have an allergy nurse and dietician at primary level for each UK health region. That does not seem a huge ask to me but, apparently, there is a postcode lottery for specialist allergy services. Secondly there should be a national register to consolidate patient data across the country and track allergy diagnoses. Clearly, this would enable the identifying of areas where additional services were needed. Thirdly, prescription costs should be removed for those living with allergies to address the additional costs people face when managing their allergies. The estimated total cost is £3,000 per year; I tried to quantify that but had to give up. Suffice it to say that removing at least the prescriptions costs would be a very reasonable thing, because people live with these conditions.

Earlier this week, there was a reception for people interested in allergies by the Benedict Blythe Foundation. Benedict, a little four year-old, collapsed at school and died from anaphylaxis. Helen, Benedict’s mum, whom I met this week, has been campaigning for all schools to have the recommended allergy safeguards in place. Teachers need to be able to manage the average one to two pupils with an allergy in each class, but many feel underprepared to be able to deal with a child experiencing an anaphylactic reaction. Every teacher should feel prepared. Every parent delivers their child to the care of the school every schoolday. Surely it is the duty of the school to take care of the health and well-being of that child above all else and to hand them back to the parent at the end of the day as fit and healthy as when they went in. After all, if an individual hotel room can have a notice explaining what to do in the case of an anaphylactic reaction, should not all teachers who care for the children of others have that basic knowledge too?