Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether new Operational Delivery Networks established to manage the treatment of hepatitis C have a duty to ensure equity of access to treatment for prisoners within their catchment area.

NHS England has published the service specification for Operational Delivery Networks (ODNs). The specification directs that ODNs include organisations and providers engaging with populations known to have a high prevalence of infection, such as prisoners, with the view to developing services designed to meet their specific needs. Further, the specification directs that specialist service providers will accept inward referrals of patients for treatment from prisons and other prescribed places of detention. NHS England has worked with each of the ODNs to map every prison to the relevant network and ensure that people in prison are being supported to access treatment.