Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to raise public awareness of the risk factors for chest, heart and stroke illness.

Responsibility for raising such public awareness in Scotland rests with the Scottish Government. In England, Public Health England (PHE) runs a range of national social marketing campaigns to raise awareness of the signs and symptoms of certain life-threatening illnesses and to therefore improve rates of early diagnosis. These campaigns include the Be Clear on Cancer, Act FAST and a regional pilot on breathlessness as a symptom of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and heart failure, raising awareness on lung cancer and heart and lung disease.

PHE also runs a tobacco marketing programme with a range of activity that highlights the health harms of smoking, including demonstrating the link between smoking and cancer, and heart and lung disease. As well as encouraging smokers to make quit attempts the activity signposts to proven National Health Service tools/service to help them. These programmes have been shown to have a positive impact on reducing adult smoking prevalence.

PHE works closely with the Department and NHS England to ensure that health care professionals are also targeted with campaign information to encourage earlier diagnoses and referrals.