Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what recent steps his Department has taken to issue guidance on how people aged 50 years and older might reduce the risk of their suffering strokes and heart attacks.

The Department does not plan to issue any guidance on this matter.

A significant amount of work is being taken across NHS England and Public Health England (PHE) in relation to reducing risk of heart attack and stroke, including:

- PHE’s role in addressing cardiovascular disease (CVD) is set out in Action on cardiovascular disease: getting serious about prevention which is available at the following link and includes guidance in the form of resources and support that PHE provides to help tackle CVD prevention:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cardiovascular-disease-getting-serious-about-prevention

- PHE and partners have published an updated version of the Heart Age Tool, which is designed to help people understand their heart health and cardiovascular risk factors;

- PHE supports local authorities with delivering the NHS Health Check programme, tackling the leading risk factors that contribute to preventable death and disability with the potential reach of 15 million eligible people in England, and issues regularly updated best practice guidance to help aid the implementation of the programme;

- Rolling out the NHS Diabetes Prevention Programme across England, offering intensive behaviour change support to individuals identified as at high risk of diabetes - a major cause of heart attack and stroke; and

- PHE also manages campaigns specifically targeting the over 50s including the Be Clear on Cancer campaign to raise awareness of respiratory symptoms, including breathlessness, which can be a symptom of heart disease and the Act FAST campaign to raise awareness of the signs of a stroke and encourage people to call 999 immediately, so that those experiencing a stroke get to hospital as soon as possible.