Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, whether he has made an assessment of the effect of the nationwide HRT shortage on the health of the transgender community; and if he will make a statement.

The Department fully understands that maintaining access to hormone replacement therapy (HRT) medications is vitally important to many people, including transgender people in this country.

We are aware of ongoing supply issues with some HRT preparations due to a range of issues including manufacturing issues, regulatory issues and problems accessing the raw pharmaceutical ingredient as well as commercial decisions made by some companies to divest these products.

We have been working closely with all suppliers of HRT preparations to maintain overall supply to patients. Although some HRT products are affected by supply issues, supplies of alternative HRT preparations have remained available.