Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what discussions they intend to have, if any, with pharmaceutical companies about how the environmental damage caused by asthma inhalers may be reduced.
NHS England has been in regular dialogue with industry over the last 18 months about the need to reduce the environmental damage caused by asthma inhalers. As a result, an industry working group on this has been formed, chaired by the Industry Pharmaceutical Aerosol Consortium (IPAC). IPAC has now accepted an invitation to join the national Low Carbon Inhalers Working Group, chaired by the Sustainable Development Unit, to represent industry. This working group has been asked to provide proposals from industry on reducing the carbon impacts of inhalers to support the NHS Long Term Plan target.