Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps his Department is taking to mitigate regional variations in access to non-invasive prenatal testing for Down's syndrome as recommended by the National Screening Committee in November 2016.

Public Health England is working with a range of partners to oversee the planned implementation of the non-invasive prenatal test (NIPT) for Down’s, Patau’s and Edwards’ syndromes to ensure national standards, including national and local access to the new test, are adhered to.

Public Health England is currently working through the procurement and the evaluative roll out process for NIPT for Down’s, Edwards’ and Patau’s syndromes, including the development of tender documents specification and criteria for tendering. A date of issue for these is still to be agreed. The expectation is that laboratories will be contracted to provide NIPT for Down’s, Edwards’ and Patau’s syndromes as part of the NHS Fetal Anomaly Screening Programme evaluative roll out of NIPT during financial year 2018-19.