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Written Question
Cancer: Young People
Tuesday 12th March 2024

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, pursuant to the Answer of 27 February 2024 to Question 14706 on Cancer: Young People, whether the Children and Young People Cancer Taskforce will study the impact of cancer treatment on young people's (a) cognitive function and (b) ability to learn effectively.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Children and Young People Cancer Taskforce announced on 6 February 2024 that it will explore how we can improve outcomes for children and young people with cancer. It will draw on expertise from charities, clinicians, academia, and businesses, to set the direction, and define its priorities going forward.

It is important to recognise the support built into National Health Service specifications for children’s cancer. These require children’s cancer services to take a multi-agency approach to support, and address, the wider social, educational, psychological, and emotional needs of the child and their family. This includes providing ready access to a wide range of services and professionals, including educational and rehabilitative support. These services are vital in ensuring that children and families have the support needed, to face the difficult challenges cancer brings.


Written Question
Cancer: Young People
Tuesday 27th February 2024

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of commissioning and independent review into the impact of cancer treatment on a young person's (a) cognitive function and (b) ability to learn effectively.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

Cancer is a priority for the Government, and the new Children and Young People Cancer Taskforce has been set up to progress our mission to deliver world-leading cancer services. This work will focus on cancers affecting children and young people, specifically recognising the long-term challenges that cancer and its treatment can have on children and young people.

Over the past five years, the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) has invested approximately £14 million pounds into 38 research projects on childhood cancers. The James Lind Alliance (JLA), through a Priority Setting Partnership (PSP), facilitates patients, carers, and clinicians in working collaboratively to identify research priorities in particular areas of health and care. The impact of cancer and treatment on the lives of children and families after treatment, and ways to overcome these impacts in the long term, is one of the key priorities identified by the JLA PSP. The NIHR recognises the importance of the research priorities identified by the JLA PSP, and is looking to receive applications for research studies addressing these research priorities.

Furthermore, education and the support to learn effectively are important parts of National Health Service’s specifications for cancer services for children and young people. These specifications require children’s cancer services to take a multi-agency approach to support and address the wider social, educational, psychological, and emotional needs of the child and family. This includes providing ready access to a wide range of services and professionals, encompassing educational support, which includes teachers, health play specialists, speech and language support, and rehabilitative support. These services are vital in ensuring that children and families have the support to face the challenges cancer brings.


Written Question
Paramedical Staff: Sexual Offences
Tuesday 27th February 2024

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether her Department is taking steps to tackle sexual abuse of female paramedics.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

NHS England commissioned a review into the ambulance sector culture and has welcomed the recommendations of the recent independent review, which highlights the need to target bullying and harassment, including sexual harassment, and enable the freedom to speak up.

NHS England are setting up a Delivery Board alongside an implementation plan to deliver the recommendations from the Ambulance Sector Culture report. This will include actions related to stopping misogyny and improving sexual safety in the ambulance service by the Office of the Chief Allied Health Professions at NHS England and the Association of Ambulance Chief Executives.

Last year, NHS England launched the first-ever sexual safety charter in collaboration with healthcare systems, to provide staff with clear reporting mechanisms, training, and support, ensuring that a zero-tolerance approach to tackle sexual misconduct is taken.

The 2023 NHS Staff Survey included a new question specifically around unwanted behaviour of a sexual nature to enable National Health Service organisations to understand the prevalence of misconduct in their workplace, which will inform further action to protect and support staff across the NHS. The results of the 2023 NHS Staff Survey will be published on 7 March 2024.


Written Question
Gambling: Safety
Monday 15th January 2024

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

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 assessment she has made of the accuracy of the evidence used in that analysis.

Answered by Andrea Leadsom - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

In September 2019, Public Health England published the Gambling-related harms Evidence Review. No further assessment has been made of the quantitative analysis since its original publication. The Health Survey for England conducted in 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 is available at the following link:

http://healthsurvey.hscic.gov.uk/support-guidance/public-health/health-survey-for-england-2018/introduction.aspx

In January 2023, the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities published a review and update of the economic and social costs of harms analysis.


Written Question
Natural Gas and Oil: Public Health
Monday 11th December 2023

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether her Department has made an assessment of the potential impact on public health of expanding UK oil and gas fields.

Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)

The UK Health Security Agency has not conducted a specific assessment concerning the potential impact on public health of expanding oil and gas fields in the United Kingdom.


Written Question
NHS Learning Support Fund: Pharmacy
Wednesday 6th December 2023

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, for what reason students studying Masters of Pharmacy courses do not qualify for support from the NHS Learning Support Fund.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Learning Support Fund (LSF) is available broadly to those courses which were eligible for the NHS Bursary prior to the 2017 reforms, and therefore, subjects such as pharmacy are outside of the scope of the LSF arrangements.


Written Question
NHS Learning Support Fund
Wednesday 22nd November 2023

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of extending eligibility for the NHS Learning Support Fund to people studying pharmaceutical science at (a) undergraduate and (b) postgraduate level.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Government keeps the funding arrangements for all healthcare students under close review. At all times the Government must strike a balance between the level of support students receive and the need to make best use of public funds to deliver value for money. There are no immediate plans to change the scheme design.


Written Question
Cancer: Medical Treatments
Thursday 16th November 2023

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

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 help increase public awareness of minimally invasive cancer therapies.

Answered by Andrew Stephenson - Minister of State (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Department and NHS do not normally undertake public awareness campaigns on treatments and therapies. This is because cancer patients will often have a range of treatment choices available to them and it is important that informed decisions are taken by each patient, in consultation with their treating clinician, following the advice of multi-disciplinary teams that are experts in the management of cancer.

Instead, the Department and the NHS’s focus is on early diagnosis, including raising awareness of cancer symptoms and encouraging people to come forward through public awareness campaigns such as ‘Help us, help you’. By encouraging earlier diagnosis, cancer patients will have a wider range of treatment options available to consider, including minimally invasive therapies where appropriate.

The adoption of new treatments, including minimally invasive cancer treatments, into the NHS in England is generally the result of National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidance and/or commissioner decisions. For treatments that form part of a prescribed specialised or highly specialised service, NHS England’s specialised commissioning function is responsible for putting in place access. For treatments that are not part of a prescribed specialised service, the responsibility sits with integrated care boards (ICBs). Both NHS England and ICBs are required to put in place access for any treatment that carries a positive recommendation from the Technology Appraisal programme, operated by NICE. Pharmaceutical companies are also able to accelerate access to new treatments and technologies through schemes like the Early Access to Medicines Scheme, Project Orbis or The Innovative Licensing and Access Pathway, enabling patients to benefit from innovative treatments quickly.

Looking ahead, from April 2024, ICBs will become the responsible commissioner for a number of specialised services and will want to work with and through local Cancer Alliances to plan and organise access to care that meets national standards. By integrating the commissioning of specialised and non-specialised services, ICBs will be able to join-up care around patient needs and invest in resources where they can have best effect on outcomes.


Written Question
Plastics: Health Hazards
Thursday 18th May 2023

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will create a National Plastic Health Impact Research Fund.

Answered by Will Quince

Since 2018, the Government has committed over £100 million for research and innovation support to tackle the broad range of issues that arise from plastic waste. This includes funding research on the health impacts of plastic through UK Research and Innovation and the National Institute for Health and Care Research. Whilst it is not typical to ring-fence funds for particular topics or conditions, both funders welcome funding applications for research into the health impacts of plastic.


Written Question
Draft Mental Health Bill
Friday 27th January 2023

Asked by: Kim Johnson (Labour - Liverpool, Riverside)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the Mental Health Bill, whether he plans to include a statutory duty to provide early intervention strategies to detect and address mental health issues for children and young people within primary and secondary schools; and if he will make a statement.

Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)

The draft Mental Health Bill, published in June 2022, is intended to modernise the Mental Health Act and work better for people with serious mental illness. The draft Bill has completed its pre-legislative scrutiny and the Joint Committee published its report on 19 January 2023 on the Draft Mental Health Bill. The Department will consider the Committee’s recommendations carefully and we will introduce the Bill when parliamentary time allows.

Separate to the provisions in the draft Bill, there are currently 287 mental health support teams in place in around 4,700 schools and colleges across the country, offering support to children experiencing anxiety, depression and other common mental health issue. These

teams now cover 26% of pupils, a year earlier than originally planned and this will increase to 399 teams, covering around 35% of pupils by April 2023 with over 500 planned to be deployed by 2024.