Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Bates on 6 December (HL3698), whether they are committed to eliminating hepatitis C as a public health threat in the UK by 2030; and if so, what strategy they have adopted to achieve this.

The Government is committed to eliminating hepatitis C as a major public health threat.

The United Kingdom has a comprehensive surveillance system in place combining laboratory diagnoses data, risk/behaviour data, outcome data, statistical modelling and service evaluation to monitor the cascade of care, detect outbreaks, and generate burden estimates. Prevention efforts in minimising harm in people who inject drugs is focused on access to opiate substitution therapies and needle syringe exchange programmes, and disinfection tablets in prisons. NHS England leads on treatment and continues to support National Health Service-led Operational Delivery Networks to provide National Institute for Health and Care Excellence approved treatments for hepatitis C.

Public Health England supports the Government’s efforts by publishing hepatitis C metrics which are available in the report Hepatitis C in the UK 2016 report: Working towards its elimination as a major public health threat. A copy of the report is attached.