Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will take steps to publish a joint external evaluation on the UK's capacity to (a) prevent, (b) detect and (c) rapidly respond to public health risks occurring (i) naturally and (ii) due to (A) deliberate and (B) accidental events.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
There are no current plans to publish a Joint External Evaluation. The Government works with public and private sector organisations as well as academia to understand capacity and capability needs for pandemic preparedness. The United Kingdom also contributes to global monitoring, for example, by completing the World Health Organizations’ (WHO) State-Party Self Assessment Annual Reporting tool (SPAR). There has been no joint evaluation exercise (JEE) conducted to date on the UK’s capacity to prevent, detect and rapidly respond to public health risks in the context set out in this question. However, an evaluation of Public Health England was conducted in 2015 as a trail JEE pre-cursor to WHO's current JEE process, this was a smaller scale pre-cursor to the WHO JEE which the UK was asked to help pilot and assess which is available at the following link:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/456984/IndependentReport_GHS_acc.pdf
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many dentistry practices provided NHS services and treatments in the city of Bristol in each year since 2017.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
The following table shows the number of dental practices providing services National Health Service and treatments and services in the City of Bristol from 2017 to 2022 is summarised.
Year | Number of dentistry practices providing NHS services and treatments |
2017 | 16 |
2018 | 16 |
2019 | 15 |
2020 | 14 |
2021 | 14 |
2022 | 14 |
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many dentistry practices are providing NHS services in the city of Bristol.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
The following table shows the number of dental practices providing services National Health Service and treatments and services in the City of Bristol from 2017 to 2022 is summarised.
Year | Number of dentistry practices providing NHS services and treatments |
2017 | 16 |
2018 | 16 |
2019 | 15 |
2020 | 14 |
2021 | 14 |
2022 | 14 |
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the oral contribution of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on 24 January 2022 in the Adjournment debate on NHS Dentistry: Bristol and the South-west, Official Report column 826, what recent progress has been made on engaging with key stakeholders, including the British Dental Association, on reform of the dental contract.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
NHS England and the Department worked closely with the British Dental Association (BDA) on the first phase of dental system reform. A set of improvements were negotiated on with the BDA and consulted on with a wider group of dental and patient stakeholder bodies, who approved of the improvements. These were set out in ‘Our plan for patients’, announced in September 2022, which outlines how we will meet oral health needs and increase access to National Health Service dental care. This included improving the 2006 contract to ensure fairer remuneration for practices providing complex treatment and enabling dentists to make better use of dental teams to deliver NHS treatment. This package of changes was implemented through regulations that came into effect on 25 November 2022, in addition to directions and guidance published by NHS England. They will improve access to general dentistry and make the NHS contract more attractive and sustainable to dentists and their teams.
NHS England is holding discussions and consulting with BDA and the wider dental sector for additional reforms of the NHS Dental System, planned for 2023.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what proportion of 2019 dentistry (a) appointments and (b) treatment took place in (a) 2020, (b) 2021 and (c) 2022.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
The number of unique dentistry patients seen in 2019 was 23,655,188. 56% of this number of patients were seen for treatment in 2020 and 70% in 2021.
The following table shows the proportion of courses of treatment compared to 2019.
Year | Band 1 (%) | Band 2 (%) | Band 3 (%) | Urgent (%) | Other (%) |
2020/21 | 21 | 30 | 27 | 98 | 51 |
2021/22 | 60 | 75 | 76 | 104 | 69 |
Note:
Due to the nature of the dental contract, courses of treatment have been used, rather than the number of appointments alone, which is not collected. The last weeks of 2019/20 may have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the oral contribution of the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care on 24 January 2022 in the Adjournment debate on NHS Dentistry: Bristol and the South-west, Official Report column 827, what recent progress he has made on UK recognition of the qualifications of dental practitioners from the European Economic Area (EEA) and Switzerland.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
The European Qualifications (Health and Social Care Professions) (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 provide for the automatic recognition of relevant dental qualifications obtained in the European Economic Area and Switzerland for a period of at least 24 months from the end of the transition period, 48 months for Swiss qualifications.
The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care is required under Regulation 14 of this legislation to carry out a statutory review of these arrangements after the end of the 24 month period. This review began at the start of 2023. Automatic recognition of qualifications will continue unless and until further legislation is introduced to amend or end these arrangements.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many dentistry practices offer NHS services in the South West of England.
Answered by Neil O'Brien
There are 758 dentistry practices in the South-West of England with National Health Service contracts to provide dental services.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of expanding access to the drug Liothyronine T3 for people with hypothyroidism.
Answered by Will Quince
No specific assessment has been made. Decisions about prescribing rest with the healthcare professional concerned, who has clinical responsibility for that particular aspect of a patient’s care. Prescribing is informed by a range of factors, including any national or local prescribing guidelines but, ultimately, the decision on what to prescribe is made by the prescriber themselves, using their own clinical judgement.
NHS England’s guidance ‘Items which should not be routinely prescribed in primary care’ states that levothyroxine is the first line treatment for hypothyroidism and liothyronine should not be routinely prescribed. However, the guidance states that liothyronine may be recommended for individual patients who may not respond to levothyroxine alone. This guidance has been refreshed and stakeholder feedback on proposed changes were considered in the summer.
Guidance on the prescribing of liothyronine has also been published by the Regional Medicines Optimisation Committee and this is being updated at a national level. The Department understands this will state that it is appropriate to prescribe liothyronine for some patients and sets out how prescribers may determine this, and that only patients who have not previously been reviewed should be reviewed to consider future treatment plans. This document is still being drafted and further refined following stakeholder engagement.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what recent assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of increasing the pay of NHS staff in line with the rate of inflation.
Answered by Edward Argar - Minister of State (Ministry of Justice)
The Government is looking to the independent Pay Review Bodies (PRBs) for a pay recommendation for the National Health Service. The PRBs consist of industry experts and recommendations are based on an assessment of evidence from stakeholders, including NHS system partners, trade unions, and the Government. These recommendations are informed by factors such as the cost of living and inflation, recruitment and retention, affordability and value for the taxpayer. We expect to formally receive the PRBs’ report shortly and we will consider the recommendations.
Asked by: Darren Jones (Labour - Bristol North West)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of introducing legislative proposals to require the labelling of alcoholic drinks to include sugar content for the benefit of consumers with diabetes.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The consultation to seek views on whether to introduce mandatory calorie labelling on prepacked alcohol and alcohol sold in on-trade businesses such as pubs and restaurants will be launched in due course. Respondents to the consultation will be able to provide suggestions for additional labelling requirements for consideration, such as sugar content.