Deaths: Younger Age Cohorts

Baroness Merron Excerpts

Thursday 11th January 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)]

I pay tribute to the noble Lord’s expertise in this matter. I cannot say that I am content, but I can say that the Government have improved the NHS health check, our national cardiovascular disease prevention programme, investing almost £17 million in an innovative new digital NHS health check to be rolled out from spring 2024, which is expected to deliver an additional 1 million checks in the first four years, and investing £10 million in a pilot to deliver up to 150,000 CVD checks in workplace settings. In the olden days, when we had manufacturing factories, the workforce had nurses who used to look after their health and well-being. Sadly, that is not the case these days and the Government are trying to replicate that in the workplace. But the noble Lord raised an important point, and I will take it back to the department so that I can be reassured about what he asked.

[Baroness Merron (Lab)]

My Lords, the Lancet found that deaths from cardiovascular disease among those aged 50 to 64 are one-third higher than over the previous five years. To what extent do the Government assess that this comes down to the relevant average ambulance response times being consistently above 30 minutes since the beginning of 2022? For those who are suffering heart attacks or strokes, how will the fact that the Government have now increased the target for ambulance response times help to ensure that lives are being saved?

[Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)]

The noble Baroness is absolutely right to raise this point. I am not aware of the significance of her point on ambulance times, but the NHS makes every effort, through rigorous contingency planning, to minimise the disruption. The ambulance service does a good job, but clearly it has to do more. I will write to her on the specific point about ambulance times.