Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of including confirmation of a third covid-19 booster vaccination on the NHS Covid-19 App for use by UK citizens when accessing venues and for travel overseas.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The NHS COVID-19 App is primarily a contact tracing app. App users are anonymous so it cannot be used as proof of vaccination status. The NHS App provides access to services including vaccination status and the NHS COVID pass. The NHS COVID Pass can now be used to demonstrate proof of a booster or third dose for outbound international travel and available through both the NHS App and on NHS.UK.
Booster vaccinations are currently not recorded in the domestic NHS COVID Pass as they are not required for domestic certification in England.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to support veterans who are medically discharged from the armed forces.
Answered by Nadine Dorries
As part of the Government’s continued commitment to the Armed Forces Covenant, veterans are able to access National Health Service provided mainstream and bespoke veteran services.
In England, this includes the Veterans Trauma Network. Located in 10 major trauma centres across England, with links to five specialist NHS trusts, the network works closely with Defence Medical Services, national centres of clinical expertise, veteran specific mental health services, as well as military charities to provide a complete package of care and treatment to those with service-attributable physical health conditions.
For mental health issues there is the Transition, Intervention and Liaison mental health service, which supports serving personnel who need additional mental health support as they are leaving the armed forces and for veterans who have mental health issues.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what research her Department has commissioned into the effect on human health of ingesting (a) micro- and (b) nano-plastics that have found their way into the food chain.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
The Food Standards Agency (FSA) has been monitoring the scientific evidence concerning the occurrence and effects of microplastics in seafood. On the basis of current information, the FSA considers it is unlikely that the presence of the low levels of microplastic particles that have been reported to occur in certain types of food would cause harm to consumers.
The FSA is currently commissioning a new critical review to look at existing scientific evidence on the types of microorganisms that could potentially colonise nano-plastics and microplastics in the environment, whether this could be a pathway for microbiological contamination of our food and the potential risk to human health. We anticipate this study to start in November/December 2019 and to be completed in early 2021.
In addition, the Committee on Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the Environment will be starting to consider the potential health effects of microplastics in the diet later this year.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what research her Department has commissioned into the effect on human health of ingesting micro- and nano-plastics which have found their way into the food chain.
Answered by Jo Churchill - Minister of State (Department for Work and Pensions)
It has not proved possible to respond to the hon. Member in the time available before Prorogation.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will promote the Dementia Friend training provided by the Alzheimer’s Society to officials in Government Departments.
Answered by Caroline Dinenage
The Department routinely promotes Dementia Friends to staff, including through Ministerially led initiatives during the annual Dementia Action Week.
One of the aspirations of the Challenge on Dementia 2020 is for all Government departments and public sector organisations to become dementia friendly and for all parts of local government being part of a local Dementia Action Alliance.
Government departments are actively engaging in the Dementia Friends programme with staff becoming Dementia Friends. A free, online, Dementia Friends resource is available to all civil servants.
Working with our delivery partners, we continue to target the involvement of Government departments, businesses and other large employers in the Dementia Friends Programme.
Work is already underway on a new dementia strategy for the period 2020 to 2025 which we expect to publish early next year. This will include dementia awareness as one the themes.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, pursuant to the Answer of 2 March 2016 to Question 27968, what the opening and closing dates are for the public consultation of the UK National Screening Committee's review of group B streptococcus policy; and on what date the meeting at which a decision will be made is planned.
Answered by Ben Gummer
In December 2015 the UK National Screening Committee (UK NSC) commissioned an update review into antenatal screening for Group B Streptococcus (GBS) as per its published process. A public consultation is expected to be held in the autumn for a three month period. The UK NSC will then review the recommendation for GBS at the successive meeting. Specific dates will be announced in due course.
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, when the National Screening Committee next plans to meet to review its recommendations on group B streptococcus screening for pregnant mothers.
Answered by Ben Gummer
In December 2015 the United Kingdom National Screening Committee commissioned a review into antenatal screening for Group B Streptococcus.
More information including how to contribute to the public consultation will be available using the following link:
http://legacy.screening.nhs.uk/screening-recommendations.php
Asked by: Douglas Chapman (Scottish National Party - Dunfermline and West Fife)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many health visitors were employed in (a) 2011-12, (b) 2012-13, (c) 2013-14 and (d) 2014-15.
Answered by Jane Ellison
The table below shows the number of full time equivalent health visitors employed in England at the mid-point in each year from 2011 to 2014, and the latest available figure in 2015. Data from 2012 onwards is taken from the Health Visitor Minimum Data Set (HV-MDS) which commenced in April 2012 and also includes data for health visitors employed by organisations that do not use Electronic Staff record (ESR) but do provide NHS-funded services, such as local authorities.
Full time equivalent figures are used as this is the most accurate measure of service capacity.
30 September 2011 1 | 30 September 2012 2 | 30 September 2013 | 30 September 2014 | 31 May 2015 |
7,941 | 8,678 | 9,550 | 10,800 | 11,850 |
Source: Health and Social Care Information Centre NHS Hospital and Community health service monthly workforce statistics
Notes:
1. The data for 2011 covers only those health visitors on the ESR.
2. The figure for September 2012 is different from the published figure due to a known over count (of 14).