Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government how many new HIV diagnoses were made among prisoners in 2014 in England and Wales.

Data for 2014 is not available until October 2015.

Latest data from the national human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) surveillance system shows that in 2013, of 5,594 adults (aged 15 years old or above) newly diagnosed with HIV in England and Wales, nine were newly diagnosed with HIV at a prison service. An additional 210 patients living with a diagnosed HIV infection (diagnosed before 2013) were resident in prison.

Notes:

The numbers are likely to be under-reported because prison status is not routinely collected. Prisoners were identified if the residential information provided related to a prison setting. Therefore the completeness and accuracy of the numbers depends on the clinicians’ reports. Furthermore, most prisoners have short custodial sentences and consequently may not be included in the national HIV surveillance system which collects information relating to a patients’ most recent attendance at an HIV service.