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 trends in the level of health inequalities associated with a) asthma and b) chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder.

The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) is aware of the disproportionate impact that asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD) have on deprived communities. The Government is acting on smoking, air pollution, and poor housing that will particularly benefit such communities.

Smoking is the number one preventable cause of COPD. The Tobacco and Vapes Bill will be the biggest public health intervention since the 2007 indoor smoking ban and will help deliver our ambition for a smoke-free United Kingdom.

Poor air quality can exacerbate COPD and asthma. To address this, DHSC is working across Government with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs to tackle air pollution, and the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero to fix housing and reduce damp and mould. Infections can also exacerbate COPD and asthma, so the National Health Service is running winter vaccine campaigns against respiratory infections including COVID-19, flu, and pneumococcal disease.

To enable faster diagnosis of asthma and COPD and earlier access to treatment, access to spirometry tests in community diagnostic centres (CDCs) is growing and will continue to do so as more sites come online. The first five months of 2025/26 saw an increase in CDC spirometry testing of approximately 2000 tests per month more than in the previous year.