Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Alzheimer's Research UK report Tipping Point: The Future of Dementia, published in September, what steps they are taking to address the finding in that report that "38 per cent of over-65s in England estimated to be living with dementia never get a diagnosis", potentially rendering them ineligible for any treatment that is approved.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Diagnosis of dementia is vital to ensure that a person with dementia can access the advice, information, care and support that can help them to live well with the condition and remain independent for as long as possible.
In December 2022, the recovery of the dementia diagnosis rate to the national ambition of 66.7% was included in the National Health Service priorities and operational planning guidance as part of the refined mental health objectives for 2023/24. This reinforces the importance of dementia as a key priority for NHS England and provides a clear direction for integrated care boards to support delivery of timely diagnoses within systems.
NHS England continues to monitor the monthly dementia diagnosis rate and analyse trends at national, regional and integrated commissioning board level.
The estimated dementia diagnosis rate has been increasing throughout 2023 and in October reached 64.5%, the highest rate since the introduction of the primary care dementia publication in April 2022.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Alzheimer's Research UK report Tipping Point: The Future of Dementia, published in September, what steps they are taking to improve access to dementia diagnosis technologies, such as PET scans and lumbar punctures.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
NHS England has established a dedicated national programme team which is working in partnership with other national agencies and with local health systems to co-ordinate the preparations for the potential roll out of new treatments for use in the earlier stages of Alzheimer’s disease. These plans assume that, if these new treatments are approved by the regulators, significant additional diagnostic capacity, including amyloid PET-CT, lumbar puncture and MRI, will be needed both to identify patients who are most able to benefit and to provide important safety monitoring for potential adverse effects during treatment.
NHS England is also working with partner agencies to support and inform further research into other diagnostic modalities, including blood-based biomarker and digital tests, which will help improve identification and management of Alzheimer’s disease.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Alzheimer's Research UK report Tipping Point: The Future of Dementia, published in September, what steps they are taking to support the implementation of new dementia diagnostics such as blood tests.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
In anticipation of any new Alzheimer’s treatments that might achieve a licence and subsequently be determined by National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) to be safe, clinically and cost effective for routine use in the National Health Service, NHS England has stepped up and accelerated preparation for implementation.
A dedicated programme team has been established and is working across the NHS and with industry partners and patient groups to make sure that the NHS is planning ahead, understanding the opportunities, choices and key decisions that will need to be taken in the weeks and months ahead to enable the roll out of any NICE recommended treatments.
This includes developing and implementing new care pathways that both rely on current diagnostic and treatment monitoring options, and consider those identified through expert clinical advice and horizon scanning as having the potential for routine NHS use in the future.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government when they will go to tender for the Respiratory Syncytial Virus immunisation programme.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Detailed policy options based on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation’s advice on respiratory syncytial virus immunisation programmes to protect infants and adults are being developed. Any tender process would only begin once Ministers have reviewed these options and taken a decision.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government when they intend to provide policy options on the immunisation programme for Respiratory Syncytial Virus.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Detailed policy options based on the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation’s advice on respiratory syncytial virus immunisation programmes to protect infants and adults are being developed. The Department is working with the UK Health Security Agency and NHS England on these options, with NHS England leading on delivery.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to support research into the development of new, scalable diagnostic tests for dementia; and what assessment they have of the current proportion of patients receiving an accurate dementia diagnosis that includes a specialist diagnosis of the sub-type of dementia.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Government responsibility for delivering dementia research is shared between the Department of Health and Social Care, with research delivered by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), and the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, with research delivered via UK Research and Innovation (UKRI).
The NIHR and has invested nearly £11 million to develop new digital approaches for the early detection and diagnosis of dementia. The NIHR-funded SABRE study aims to translate the diagnostic capability of spatial tests into routine clinical practice for use in ageing populations to diagnose Alzheimer’s Disease.
Through the UKRI-funded UK Dementia Research Institute, scientists are undertaking research on the biological mechanisms of dementia, driving early-stage development of diagnostics and treatments, and developing innovative technologies for assisted living.
From April 2023, NHS England started collecting data on dementia sub types from GP systems under the following categories: Alzheimer’s, Vascular, Mixed and Other. This was included in the monthly publication of Primary Care Dementia Data from 20 July 2023.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the benefits of expanding the portion of the flu immunisation programme delivered by community pharmacies.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
National Health Service providers determine how many seasonal flu vaccines to buy each year based on their local populations, eligible cohorts and uptake ambitions for the NHS programme as outlined in the annual flu system letter. The letter, published on 25 May 2023, is based on the advice of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation who review the latest evidence on flu vaccines and advise on the type of vaccine to be offered to different age groups and on which vaccines should be prioritised for various at-risk groups.
In 2022/23, approximately 9,800 out of a total of around 10,800 community pharmacies delivered flu vaccinations in England. In the same year, approximately 700 community pharmacies piloted using the NHS National Booking Scheme for flu appointments for the first time. In terms of this year’s programme, all community pharmacies delivering COVID-19 vaccinations will be expected to deliver flu vaccines too. All pharmacies will be given the functionality to offer flu appointments via the national booking system with the aim of increasing coadministration of COVID-19 and flu vaccinations.
The community pharmacy service is currently an advanced service, which means it is commissioned nationally and any contractor that meets the criteria for the service can deliver it. We do not expect a significant change to be seen to the proportion of seasonal flu vaccination programme being delivered by community pharmacies, which is estimated to be approximately 86% total number of community pharmacies, in 2023/24.
In terms of this year’s programme, all community pharmacies delivering COVID-19 vaccinations will be expected to deliver flu vaccines too. All pharmacies will be given the functionality to offer flu appointments via the national booking system with the aim of increasing coadministration of COVID-19 and flu vaccinations.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the scale of the gap in the understanding of neurodegenerative diseases; how this compares to other similarly complex disease areas; and what steps they are taking to support research into the biological causes of dementia.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
Government responsibility for delivering dementia and neurodegeneration research is shared between the Department of Health and Social Care, with research delivered by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR), and the Department of Science, Innovation and Technology, with research delivered via UK Research and Innovation. The NIHR funds translational, clinical, and applied health and care research.
The Government has not assessed the scale of the gap in the understanding of neurodegenerative diseases; and how this compares to other similarly complex disease areas. However, the Government has funded research which looks across neurodegenerative and complex conditions and opportunities to apply learning from research into one condition to another. A recent study undertaken at the Medical Research Council Laboratory of Molecular Biology determined the structures of α-synuclein filaments from the brains of individuals with Parkinson’s disease and dementia with Lewy bodies, which will aid in the development of better diagnostics for Lewy body diseases.
The Government supports research into the biological causes of dementia, for example, at the UK Dementia Research Institute, scientists are undertaking ground-breaking research on the biological mechanisms of dementia, driving early-stage development of diagnostics and treatments, and developing innovative technologies for assisted living.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government what is the breakdown by department of the current allocation of Government funding for projects aimed at translating health research into practical innovations; what plans they have, if any, to increase such funding; how they plan to support collaborations between academic institutions and industry to expedite the development of healthcare technologies and treatments; and what steps they are taking to ensure that promising research findings are supported for successful translation into practical applications.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Department funds and enables research through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). In 2022/23, the NIHR budget was approximately £1.25 billion and enabling translation of research into practice is embedded across multiple workstreams in the NIHR portfolio. Its close working with the NHS England Accelerated Access Collaborative also promotes the adoption and diffusion of proven innovations and the decommissioning of ineffective or superseded interventions. The Innovative Licensing and Access Pathway, launched in 2021, also aims to accelerate the time to market by streamlining the regulatory and access processes, particularly for innovative and promising medicines, ensuring that they reach patients more efficiently and rapidly.
Asked by: Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government under what circumstances they would consider reintroducing the 50-to-64-year-old age cohort into the flu vaccine programme, as was the case during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)
The Government’s policy on groups eligible for flu vaccination is based on the recommendation of the independent expert body the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI).
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the JCVI was supportive of the temporary expansion of the influenza programme to extend eligibility to all adults aged between 50 and 64 years of age to protect the population from the potential threat of co-circulation of COVID-19 and flu and alleviate pressure on the National Health Service. This was the policy for both the 2020 to 2021 and 2021 to 2022 seasons.
The success of the COVID-19 vaccination programme and a better understanding of SARS-CoV-2 infection means that we are now able to return eligibility for the flu vaccination programme back to the approach taken pre-pandemic.