Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, with reference to NHS England's press release entitled Hundreds of thousands of NHS patients to be offered the chance to travel for treatment, published on 31 October 2023, whether her Department has made an assessment of the demographics of patients who are most likely to benefit from the opportunity to travel for treatment; and what assessment she has made of the potential impact of this policy on health inequalities.

While providers have notified patients of the opportunity to travel, the decision to request to move rests with the patient. We are therefore unable to assess the demographics of the patients who will benefit until they have responded.