Diabetes

Lord McColl of Dulwich Excerpts

Thursday 10th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Earl Howe]

The noble Lord is absolutely right that this is a major public health issue and one that impacts very seriously on the health and well-being of individuals, so it is a priority for us. We are committed to reducing the number of avoidable amputations among people with diabetes. In fact, progress is being made: although the number of amputations is going up, the rate is falling. However, we are under no illusion that this will be a growing problem because of the growing number of people with diabetes. All our work on improving completion of the NICE nine care processes for people with diabetes and improving timely access to specialist diabetic footcare multidisciplinary teams will support that aim, and the Diabetes UK Putting Feet First campaign has real potential to improve awareness of foot complications in diabetes.

[Lord McColl of Dulwich]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that the real way to reduce the number of amputations is to reduce the incidence of diabetes and that the way to do that is to do something about the obesity epidemic, which is the main cause of diabetes and one of the main causes of amputation? What is he doing to try to prevent that quango, NICE, misleading the nation and politicians, as it did, into believing that the answer to the obesity epidemic was to take more exercise when, although exercise is important, the real answer is to eat fewer calories?

[Earl Howe]

I agree with my noble friend about the importance of targeting obesity as a serious public health risk and one which leads to diabetes in many cases. I believe that, if my noble friend were to talk to NICE about its recommendations to prevent obesity, he would find that its line is slightly modified from the one that he has criticised. We should pay tribute to NICE for the good work it has done in the specific area of diabetes. The recommendations and guidelines it has issued have been very positive. There is, of course, a quality standard for diabetes, which is also excellent.