Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to tackle disparities in regional medicine supply in High Wycombe in comparison to other areas in NHS England.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
The Department has established processes to prevent, manage and mitigate medicine shortages in England, including in High Wycombe. We work with the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, the pharmaceutical industry and the National Health Service to maintain overall supply. Local pharmacies have specific commercial arrangements in place to ensure the continuity of supplies.
Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make Evusheld available on prescription to people with immunosuppressed conditions.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The Department is conducting an assessment of Evusheld, including seeking advice from clinicians on the most appropriate option for the National Health Service in line with available data, the public health situation and other treatments available. While we are considering the advice received, we are unable to confirm a timetable for any decision.
Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, for what reason the UK Health Security Agency only reports on SARS-CoV-2, influenza, and RSV in its weekly reports.
Answered by Maggie Throup
COVID-19, influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) are monitored due to the potential public health, transmission patterns and infection to causing overt disease. Surveillance in England of other respiratory viruses including rhinovirus, adenovirus, parainfluenza and human metapneumovirus is also published in the weekly flu and COVID-19 surveillance report. Other infectious diseases such as HIV, tuberculosis and hepatis C are monitored appropriate to the nature of the transmission and how the disease manifests.
Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the potential impact on consumers of businesses substituting products high in fat, salt and sugar in prominent supermarket locations for alternatives as a result of HFSS placement restrictions.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The costs to businesses were considered in the Government’s impact assessment for the placement restrictions, published in December 2020. The impact assessment shows that the costs for businesses are expected to be £423 million per year, with transition costs in the first year expected to be £47 million. The impact assessment of the location restrictions shows that while there is a possibility of businesses passing on the cost of the regulations to consumers, due to the competitive pressures of retailers it is unlikely this would occur.
We recognise the costs associated with implementing this policy. However, the costs of obesity to individuals, society and the National Health Service are considerable and the benefits from reducing calorie intakes across the population are substantial. We are encouraging retailers to adjust the balance of promotions towards healthier options and maximise the availability of healthier products available on promotion. The impact assessment shows that this policy is expected to deliver significant health benefits of £58 billion and additionally provide savings to the NHS of over £4 billion, over a 25-year period.
Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
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 6 June 2022 to Question 9876, on Food: Advertising, what recent assessment his Department has made of the extent of (a) the additional costs to businesses of HFSS placement restrictions and (b) the cost to consumers if businesses pass on those costs.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The costs to businesses were considered in the Government’s impact assessment for the placement restrictions, published in December 2020. The impact assessment shows that the costs for businesses are expected to be £423 million per year, with transition costs in the first year expected to be £47 million. The impact assessment of the location restrictions shows that while there is a possibility of businesses passing on the cost of the regulations to consumers, due to the competitive pressures of retailers it is unlikely this would occur.
We recognise the costs associated with implementing this policy. However, the costs of obesity to individuals, society and the National Health Service are considerable and the benefits from reducing calorie intakes across the population are substantial. We are encouraging retailers to adjust the balance of promotions towards healthier options and maximise the availability of healthier products available on promotion. The impact assessment shows that this policy is expected to deliver significant health benefits of £58 billion and additionally provide savings to the NHS of over £4 billion, over a 25-year period.
Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment his Department has made of the impact of HFSS placement restrictions on the cost of living.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The Government’s impact assessment shows the placement of products within stores significantly affects household spending, with end of aisle displays increasing sales of soft drinks by over 50%.
Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what the purpose is of the UK Health Security Agency's contact tracing contract with SERCO, entitled Provision of Contact Centre Services for The Single Service Centre SERCO Contract, beginning 16 February 2022 for £211,876,932.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The purpose of the contract is to provide positive case tracing, contact tracing, isolation follow-up, international translation services, surge capacity for test enquiries and bookings and Tier 1 119 services. The supplier may be requested to undertake additional services if required.
Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps he is taking to improve access to GP services in Wycombe.
Answered by Maria Caulfield - Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Department for Business and Trade) (Minister for Women)
During the pandemic, we have made £520 million available to improve access and expand general practice capacity. In October 2021, we published measures to allow more patients to see or speak to general practitioners and primary care teams during the winter, supported by the Winter Access Fund. Between November 2021 and March 2022, this supported Wycombe’s Primary Care Networks to offer more than 7,900 additional appointments.
We have committed £1.5 billion to create an additional 50 million general practice appointments a year by 2024 by increasing and diversifying the workforce. In the Buckingham Clinical Commissioning Group area, there were on average an estimated 10,900 appointments per working day in March 2022 excluding COVID-19 vaccination appointments, compared to 10,300 in March 2021. NHS England and NHS Improvement have advised that six practices will receive funding for new advanced telephony systems, with a further three practices already in receipt of funding for existing advanced systems. This will provide more capacity, flexibility for patients and enable more efficient use of existing practice staff.
Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will publish his Department's negotiating position on a new convention, agreement, or other international instrument under the auspices of the World Health Organisation on pandemic prevention, preparedness and response; and if he will make an (a) oral and (b) written statement.
Answered by Sajid Javid
The United Kingdom supports a new international instrument to strengthen pandemic prevention and preparedness. The purpose of the instrument is to strengthen global cooperation in order to better protect the UK from the health, social and economic impacts of pandemics. We want to agree UK priority areas such as improving transparency, timely data sharing and supporting equitable access to vaccines and treatments.
We are clear that the UK would not sign up to any instrument that compromises the UK’s sovereignty. That includes any instrument which compromises the UK’s ability to take domestic decisions on national restrictions or other measures. On the contrary, our support for a new pandemic instrument is intended to strengthen our ability to prevent, detect and respond to future health threats without the restrictions seen during the COVID-19 pandemic. The UK has led from the front on learning to live with COVID-19 and will continue to do so at the forthcoming G7 and World Health Assembly.
Asked by: Steve Baker (Conservative - Wycombe)
Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to the report published by Collateral Global entitled Understanding Definitions and Reporting of Deaths Attributed to COVID-19 in the UK, if he will take steps to reduce the use of aggregate data as severity markers during potential future pandemics as a result of the heterogeneity of definitions of cases and attribution of deaths.
Answered by Maggie Throup
The UK Health Security Agency publishes data on deaths in England on the GOV.UK COVID-19 Dashboard by age, sex, date of death and local authority to understand population level trends in the pandemic while reducing the risk of deductive disclosure of individual patient information. Aggregate data on hospitalisations is based on data reported to NHS England and NHS Improvement.