Appropriate ME Treatment

Justine Greening Excerpts

Thursday 24th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sir David Amess (Southend West) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Glasgow North West (Carol Monaghan), along with the hon. Member for Ceredigion (Ben Lake) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough (Nicky Morgan), on initiating this debate. I first heard ME being mentioned in the Chamber in the 1980s by, I think, the late Richard Holt on these Benches and Jimmy Hood on the Labour Benches. I could not pronounce the long title of the condition, but they could. As the hon. Member for Glasgow North West has said, it is disappointing that not much progress has been made, all these years later.

Like so many other Members, I am here today to speak on behalf of constituents with ME who want their voices to be heard. I am thinking of last week’s Westminster Hall debate on fibromyalgia, which is another of those problems that is not spoken about much. ME is also an invisible illness, and many people suffer in silence, so I will be using this opportunity to speak on behalf of my 500 constituents in Southend West who suffer from the illness. I would like to share with the House the words of one of them, Isabel Butler, whose moving story tells of the devastating impact of the condition, and the desperate need for the Government to take action. She says:

“I was a trainee teacher and raising my young son, having just graduated with a first class honours degree when I was struck down suddenly with this horrific illness in 2003. I battled on in pain, and despite repeated visits to my GP was simply fobbed off with antidepressants. I was not depressed, I wanted to do things but for every exertion I was overcome with pain that left me bedbound for days. Despite my best efforts and determination, I was too unwell to continue my job and pursue the career I had also dreamt of. The worst of it is, I went undiagnosed for seven long years. People don’t believe you when you tell them that you are ill, so you keep quiet, even when I had been admitted to hospital, as medics can often turn on you in contempt at the mention of ME.”

[Justine Greening (Putney) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is setting out a shocking case, and I am sure that we will hear many others like it today. The key to this has to be research, so that we can start to understand this terrible disease and then be able to build proper treatments that actually have a chance of working.

[Sir David Amess]

I am taken by the fact that we have two former Secretaries of State sitting together—my right hon. Friend the Member for Putney (Justine Greening) and my right hon. Friend the Member for Loughborough —and I certainly listen well to their advice. I absolutely agree with what my right hon. Friend says.

My constituent goes on to say:

“I do not understand why we are not being believed. I had a promising life, two beautiful boys and a career I loved. I didn’t choose to be this ill with no hope of any treatment, compassion or cure.”

The overwhelming experience of sufferers is a struggle to be believed. There is a lack of understanding among the public, policy makers and, most worrying of all, the medical profession.