Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, if he will make it his policy that pancreatic cancer patients receive treatment within 20 days of diagnosis.

The NHS Long Term Plan published in January 2019 sets out the Government’s ambitions to see 55,000 more people surviving cancer for five years in England each year from 2028 and three quarters of all cancers detected at an early stage by 2028. To achieve these targets, we will need to make significant progress on survival across all cancers, including pancreatic cancer.

NHS England will shortly be introducing a Faster Diagnostic Standard of 28 days for all cancer patients which, when taken together with the 62-day referral to treatment standard, will mean that all patients should expect to start their treatment within 34 days of diagnosis. This is a maximum, and trusts should continue to treat patients more quickly particularly where there is a strong clinical need.