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Written Question
Viral Diseases: Artificial Intelligence
Thursday 26th October 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the findings of the Nature article Learning from prepandemic data to forecast viral escape, published on 11 October, about the use of artificial intelligence as a tool to predict virus variants and aid in vaccine developments.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

It has not proved possible to respond to this question in the time available before Prorogation. Ministers will correspond directly with the Member.


Written Question
Cost of Living: Life Expectancy
Monday 23rd October 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the increased cost of living on life expectancy.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

We have made no assessment of the impact of the cost of living on life expectancy.

However, the Government is providing total support of over £94 billion over 2022/23 and 2023/24 to help households and individuals with the rising cost of living, one of the largest support packages in Europe.

On 24 January 2023, we announced our plan to publish the Major Conditions Strategy (MCS). This strategy will explore how we can tackle the key drivers of ill-health in England. It will focus on six major groups of conditions, namely cancers, mental health, cardiovascular disease (including stroke and diabetes), dementia, chronic respiratory diseases and musculoskeletal disorders, that account for approximately 60% of ill-health and early death in England.

Related to the MCS, the Department has worked closely with the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to understand the inequalities in mortality involving common physical health conditions including cancers, cardiovascular diseases, chronic kidney disease, dementia, diabetes and respiratory diseases. The Department has also previously worked with the ONS to estimate the number of people with cardiovascular or respiratory conditions living in poverty in England.


Written Question
Chronic Illnesses: Genetics
Monday 2nd October 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the AlphaMissense model by Google, which uses artificial intelligence to analyse the effects of DNA mutations in causing health conditions.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

Genomics England has tested the AlphaMissense model as part of their regular research activities to investigate algorithms that may eventually be used to improve the interpretation of variants for patients with rare diseases or cancer. Many further steps are required before it is clear how this type of algorithm may help expert clinical scientists in the National Health Service to make the best decisions for NHS patients.


Written Question
Social Workers: Recruitment
Monday 3rd July 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what plans, if any, they have to develop a robust national workforce plan for social workers by the end of 2023.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

In December 2021, the Government set out its strategy for the social care workforce in ‘The People at the Heart of Care’ white paper. This paper set out the Government’s commitment to the continued success of the social work profession.


Written Question
Coronavirus
Wednesday 28th June 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of (1) inequalities in health, and (2) any increase in structural racism, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic; and what steps they are taking in response.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The gap in the number of years different groups of people live in good health is stark and unacceptable. Health disparities exist across a variety of conditions and contribute to variations in life expectancy and healthy life expectancy.

In July 2020, the then Prime Minister appointed the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities to consider the causes of persistent disparities and barriers that different ethnic minority groups face, including the role of racism. The Commission published its report in March 2021, and the Government's response, ‘Inclusive Britain’, was published in March 2022.

In June 2020, Public Health England published the ‘COVID-19: review of disparities in risks and outcomes’ report, outlining the impact of COVID-19 on health inequalities. In response, the then Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care asked the Minister for Equalities, with support from the Cabinet Office Race Disparity Unit (RDU), to lead cross-government work to look at why COVID-19 was having a disproportionate impact on ethnic minority groups and to consider how the government response to this could be improved. The ‘Final report on progress to address COVID-19 health inequalities’ was published in December 2021.

The Office for Health Improvement and Disparities was established in October 2021 to work across the Department, the rest of Government, the healthcare system, local Government and industry to be creative about how we shift our focus towards preventing ill health, in particular in the places and communities where there are the most significant disparities.

In the white paper ‘Levelling Up the United Kingdom’, published in February 2022, the government set out a levelling up health mission to narrow the gap in healthy life expectancy (HLE) between local areas where it is highest and lowest by 2030, and increase HLE by five years by 2035. A range of action is being taken forward which will support progress on the health mission, including the development of a Major Conditions Strategy on which an interim report will be published in the summer.


Written Question
Dentistry: Vacancies
Monday 5th June 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to address staff shortages within NHS dentistry.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

In July 2022, we announced a package of dental system improvements to increase access for National Health Service dental patients and make NHS dentistry more attractive to practices. NHS England negotiated amendments to the NHS dental contract with the British Dental Association and other stakeholders. These improvements, which came into effect in November 2022, will ensure dentists are more fairly remunerated for the delivery of NHS care and making NHS dentistry a more attractive place to work and improve access for patients.

We have also recently simplified the General Dental Council's legislative framework for the registration of international dentists and dental care professionals (DCPs). The legislative changes came into force on 8 March 2023. We will announce our plan for further reform of the NHS dental system later this year. It will include several areas requiring further action to support and recover activity in NHS dentistry. We are also committed to publishing a long-term NHS workforce plan that will set out the actions and reforms that are required to reduce supply gaps and improve retention, including in dentistry.


Written Question
Mental Health Services: Administrative Delays
Monday 5th June 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to tackle the reported backlog of people requiring urgent mental health support.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The NHS Long Term Plan commits an additional £2.3 billion a year for the expansion and transformation of mental health services in England by 2024 so that an additional two million people can get the National Health Service funded mental health support that they need.

To support people experiencing mental health crisis better we are delivering the commitment to make urgent mental health support universally available via NHS111, rolling-out specialised mental health ambulances, supported by £7 million of capital investment and embedding mental health professionals in all emergency operations centres and improving mental health training for ambulance staff.

To reduce pressure on urgent and emergency care, we provided our delivery plan for recovering urgent and emergency care services which aims to deliver one of the fastest and longest sustained improvements in waiting times in the NHS's history. Through this plan we are adding 5,000 additional beds to the permanent bed base ahead of next winter and scaling up virtual wards, delivering 800 new ambulances, including the specialist mental health ambulances and expanding community services including falls, frailty and community response teams.

We have already seen average ambulance response times for Category 2 incidents improve by nearly an hour since December 2022 from 1 hour 32 minutes 54 seconds to 33 minutes 26 seconds by April 2023.


Written Question
Healthy Start Scheme
Tuesday 23rd May 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, to expand the Healthy Start voucher scheme.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

The Department has no plans to expand the Healthy Start scheme. The scheme is kept under continuous review.


Written Question
Nurses: Vacancies
Friday 19th May 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what steps they are taking to address shortages in the nursing sector, with particular regard to specialist roles.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

We are on track to meet the commitment to 50,000 extra nurses in the National Health Service in England by 2024, with almost 43,000 more nurses in February 2023 compared with September 2019. This includes nurses working in specialist nursing roles. Additionally, there are over 5,300 more doctors and over 12,300 more nurses working across the NHS compared to a year ago.


Written Question
Prescriptions: Digital Technology
Thursday 27th April 2023

Asked by: Lord Taylor of Warwick (Non-affiliated - Life peer)

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask His Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, to introduce a digital prescription scheme for patients who have repeat prescriptions.

Answered by Lord Markham - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Health and Social Care)

Digital prescriptions are already available. The Electronic Prescription Service (EPS) is a collection of IT systems, used in primary care, that interact with each other via a central national spine. It is how National Health Service electronic prescriptions in primary care are generated, transmitted and received, and allows prescribers to send prescriptions electronically to a dispenser, such as a pharmacy. The EPS supports two schemes for patients with regular repeat medicines: firstly, repeat prescribing, which allows the setting up, ordering, producing and sending of prescriptions and the review of medication. This allows prescribers to oversee the process and for patients to order their medicines if and when they are needed via their general practice (GP) surgery, the NHS App or another online service or app. Secondly, there is Electronic Repeat Dispensing, which allows a GP to send a series of prescriptions to the national spine in one go. These are held securely, accessible only by the patient’s pharmacy, which repeat dispenses against a prescription at appropriate intervals, so that there is no need to contact the GP to order them each time.

In addition, the NHS App allows for patients to digitally request and manage their repeat prescriptions.