Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:
To ask His Majesty's Government, in regard to the NHS 10 Year Health Plan for England, what assessment they have made of opportunities to identify genetic risk for diabetes, and what plans they have to implement that genetic testing as part of the shift to diabetes prevention.
The National Health Service, in partnership with Our Future Health, will trial the use of Integrated Risk Scores, which combine genomic data with lifestyle and other non-biological risk factors, within neighbourhood health services. This partnership will generate important evidence to inform whether, and how, integrated risk scores could be used more widely in the NHS. The partnership will initially focus on cardiovascular disease but is set to expand to include diabetes, breast cancer, glaucoma, and osteoporosis. This work represents a significant step towards embedding genetic testing into routine preventive care, enabling earlier identification of individuals at higher genetic risk and personalised healthcare based on risk. This approach directly supports the ambitions set out in the 10-Year Health Plan for England, which commits to shifting the NHS from a reactive model to one that is predictive and preventive, using genomics and data-driven tools to tackle major conditions like diabetes earlier and more effectively.