Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to increase the number of NHS (a) radiologists and (b) oncologists.
Answered by Karin Smyth - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)
We are committed to training the staff we need, including radiologists and oncologists, to ensure patients are cared for by the right professional, when and where they need it.
We will ensure that the number of medical specialty training places meets the demands of the National Health Service in the future. NHS England will work with stakeholders to ensure that any growth is sustainable and focused in the service areas where need is greatest.
Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to her Department's publication entitled Gambling-related harms evidence review: quantitative analysis, updated on 11 January 2023, what definition of pools betting her Department used during the evidence gathering process; and which gambling activities were labelled as pools betting.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom
The Gambling-related harms evidence review: quantitative analysis has not been updated since original publication on 30 September 2019. The Health Survey for England (2012, 2015, 2016 and 2018) was used as the primary dataset for this review and analysis was carried out on this four-year combined and weighted dataset. Information on methods for data collection for the Health Survey for England is available at the following link:
The Health Survey for England asks whether survey respondents have participated in several different types gambling activities, and is included in the quantitative analysis which is available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/gambling-related-harms-evidence-review
Gambling activities were not specifically labelled as ‘pools betting’.
Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to her Department's publication entitled Gambling-related harms evidence review: quantitative analysis, updated on 11 January 2023, what methodologies were used to gather data on Football Pools.
Answered by Andrea Leadsom
The Gambling-related harms evidence review: quantitative analysis has not been updated since original publication on 30 September 2019. The Health Survey for England (2012, 2015, 2016 and 2018) was used as the primary dataset for this review and analysis was carried out on this four-year combined and weighted dataset. Information on methods for data collection for the Health Survey for England is available at the following link:
The Health Survey for England asks whether survey respondents have participated in several different types gambling activities, and is included in the quantitative analysis which is available at the following link:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/gambling-related-harms-evidence-review
Gambling activities were not specifically labelled as ‘pools betting’.
Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will outline the (a) decision-making process and (b) eligibility criteria used to determine which NHS Trusts received funding for Breast Cancer Screening Units in the financial year 2022-23.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
All National Health Service Breast Screening services were eligible for the fund, if there was commitment in agreement with NHS England, to increase breast screening activity and improve efficiencies and programme resilience.
Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what eligibility criteria his Department plan to use to determine (a) where new Community Diagnostic Centres are located and (b) the order in which they are rolled out.
Answered by Will Quince
To identify appropriate locations, integrated care systems (ICSs) are required to ensure that proposed sites meet the specifications of being separate from acute diagnostics and are able to accommodate minimum community diagnostic centre (CDC) services.
All proposed CDCs go through an approvals process led by systems and NHS England, prior to approval by Ministers.
NHS England’s ambition is that each ICS will have at least one standard or large model CDC.
The first CDCs to open were early adopter sites that could be stood up quickly with no capital investment requirements, to add much-needed additional diagnostic capacity to address the diagnostic backlog. Where required, these temporary sites are being replaced. There are no other eligibility criteria on the order in which CDCs are being rolled out.
Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many hospitals in England currently have the capability to undertake CAR-T therapy; and what steps he plans to take to increase the availability of this therapy.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
There are currently 13 National Health Service centres that are able to provide Chimeric Antigen Receptors Cell Therapy (CAR-T) for acute lymphoblastic leukaemia for children and young people up to the age of 25 years old or are able to provide CAR-T for adults with large B-cell lymphoma.
In October 2021, NHS England wrote to all allogeneic transplant centres in England who were not CAR-T providers to invite them to express an interest in becoming a commissioned provider of CAR-T services in adults.
Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what data his Department holds on the number of countries that have approved CAR-T therapy for the treatment of multiple myeloma.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
The information requested is not held centrally.
Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make an estimate of the number of countries which have currently approved CAR-T therapy, broken down by condition.
Answered by Helen Whately - Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
The information requested is not held centrally.
Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the forthcoming analysis by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence of the effectiveness of the use of CAR-T therapy for multiple myeloma, which national tariffs NICE will use for that analysis; how those tariffs were calculated; which (a) people and (b) organisations were consulted on the calculation of the tariff; and which tariffs were used by NICE in analysis of the use of CAR-T therapy for other conditions.
Answered by Will Quince
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) is currently evaluating ciltacabtagene autoleucel, a type of CAR-T therapy, within its marketing authorisation for relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma. NICE has previously evaluated other CAR-T therapies such as axicabtagene ciloleucel (Yescarta®) and tisagenlecleucel (Kymriah®) through its technology appraisal programme.
NICE’s technology appraisal process requires the manufacturer or sponsor of the technology under evaluation to produce an evidence submission that is developed in line with NICE’s preferred methods for economic evaluation (the “reference case”) as set out in its published manual for health technology evaluation. The evidence submission is then considered by NICE’s appraisal committee alongside a critique from an independent academic group and evidence from other stakeholders such as patients, clinicians and NHS England. During the ongoing appraisal of axicabtagene ciloleucel for treating relapsed or refractory follicular lymphoma, NHS England made the committee aware of a single tariff for the delivery of CAR T-cell therapies. NICE does not hold any information on who NHS England consulted on the calculation of the tariff.
NICE’s health technology evaluation manual states that the reference case “should include the full additional costs associated with introducing a technology”. The appraisal committee will consider in developing its recommendations whether the costs that are captured in the evidence submission appropriately reflect the costs to the National Health Service.
The committee papers for previous and ongoing appraisals of CAR-T therapies are available on the NICE website.
Asked by: Clive Betts (Labour - Sheffield South East)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many of the qualified meat inspectors working for the Food Standards Agency are employees; and how many of these are (a) permanent, (b) temporary, (c) casual and (d) agency employees.
Answered by Neil O'Brien - Shadow Minister (Education)
There is a total of 659, including 57 casuals, qualified meat hygiene inspectors employed by the Food Standards Agency and our contractor. Of the 314 qualified meat hygiene inspectors employed by the Food Standards Agency, 296 are permanent and 18 are casual, paid an hourly rate of between £13.99 to £18.00 per hour. 306 qualified meat hygiene inspectors are employed by a contractor including 39 casuals. The information on the hourly rate of pay is unavailable as it is commercially sensitive.