---

Hepatitis C

12. Mr. Peter Luff (Mid-Worcestershire) (Con): If she will make a statement on her policy on the treatment of hepatitis C. [177296]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Miss Melanie Johnson): In recent years, increasingly effective treatments for chronic hepatitis C have become available. In January 2004, the National Institute for Clinical Excellence recommended a combination of pegylated interferon and ribavirin for the treatment of patients with moderate to severe chronic hepatitis C, which successfully clears the infection in around 55 per cent. of patients.

Mr. Luff: My own father died of hepatitis C when I was eight years old—he probably contracted the disease in Palestine during the first world war—so the Minister
 
8 Jun 2004 : Column 142
 
will understand my personal grudge against the disease, and my concern for the 250,000 people in England alone who have the disease and do not know it. Why are the Government not showing more urgency in dealing with the looming hepatitis C crisis? Why, for example, does the advisory group on hepatitis website state this morning that the agenda and minutes of meetings

"will be available starting with the meeting due to be held on the 8th October 2003"?

More importantly, why is the action plan, the publication of which was promised by the end of 2002, still not available?

Miss Johnson: I understand why the hon. Gentleman is particularly passionate about the subject. I shall correct one figure that he gave: we estimate that about 200,000 people in England, 0.4 per cent. of the population, are infected with hepatitis C—in some cases, the infection clears spontaneously. On current action, we have, as I said, improved the drug treatments. I assure the hon. Gentleman that the Department of Health will publish a hepatitis C action plan, which will highlight the need for prevention and for increased identification and treatment of infected patients.

Mr. Simon Burns (West Chelmsford) (Con): Where? When?

Miss Johnson: I am just coming on to that subject. The plan will be forthcoming over the summer and into the autumn, and it will lead to more diagnoses of hepatitis C, which will allow more people to be considered for treatment.

NHS Estates

13. Roger Casale (Wimbledon) (Lab): What plans he has to review the criteria and procedures by which the NHS acquires and disposes of estates. [177297]

The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr. John Hutton): The latest guidance on the conduct of land acquisitions and disposals is contained in the Department's "Estatecode", a copy of which is in the Library. An updated version of that code was published last year. The guidance is kept under regular review.

Roger Casale: I thank my right hon. Friend for that reply. Does he recognise, however, that the wider public interest concerns—not least the quality of our urban environment—that are often involved in the disposal of NHS estates should be properly taken account of by the executives, who may be legally constrained, who undertake such disposals? Will my right hon. Friend undertake to review the guidance notes?

In the meantime, will the Minister consider examples of best practice such as the St. George's Healthcare NHS Trust in south-west London, which is disposing of the former Atkinson Morley's hospital site and is working with Merton council and local residents on projects such as a competition, to ensure that the best quality design is used? That not only gives us the money that we need to invest in the NHS, but is in people's best interests from the point of view of wider concerns such as the safeguarding of our green spaces.
 
8 Jun 2004 : Column 143
 

Mr. Hutton: Yes, I can give my hon. Friend that assurance. I pay tribute to his work in representing his constituents on the development of the Atkinson Morley's site. I understand that the trust is in the process of submitting a revised planning application for the use of that land in order better to reflect some of the concerns expressed by my hon. Friend and his constituents. I am sure that he and they will welcome the fact that because it is metropolitan open land, there are restrictions on the extent to which it can be redeveloped. We always try to identify best practice across the NHS, and some of the work done by trusts in my hon. Friend's constituency certainly counts as that.

Hip Replacements

14. Martin Linton (Battersea) (Lab): What the estimated cost is of a hip replacement operation paid for by the NHS in (a) an NHS hospital and (b) the private health sector. [177298]

The Minister of State, Department of Health (Mr. John Hutton): The latest figures indicate that the average cost of a primary hip replacement operation incurred by the NHS was £4,660 and that the cost outside the NHS was £6,848.

Martin Linton: I welcome my right hon. Friend's comments on the Atkinson Morley's site.

Does my right hon. Friend agree that those figures show why our health service is the most cost-effective in the world and why thousands are coming back to the NHS every week?

Mr. Hutton: Certainly, the NHS is a very efficient health care system, as has been confirmed by international evidence and research. The costs of administering our national health service are lower than those of any other country or private sector provider.

Miss Anne McIntosh (Vale of York) (Con): Of the hip replacements carried out in the NHS, how many are conducted by foreign-trained consultants, who are often foreign based and only temporarily based in the UK? Where the NHS is required to take action against such a consultant, how can it do so if they have returned to their home base?

Mr. Hutton: I shall provide figures for the hon. Lady on the specific point that she raises.
 
8 Jun 2004 : Column 144
 

It is of course true that many of the surgeons who are employed in the NHS trained overseas. I hope that the hon. Lady is not suggesting that they are providing anything less than effective care for patients. As regards surgeons provided by the new independent sector treatment centres, it remains the case that the NHS is responsible for the care and treatment that is provided in those settings, as are providers, and proper arrangements are in place to ensure that there is insurance cover.

As for the standards of care that surgeons provide, they must all be registered with the General Medical Council on the specialist register, so they have exactly the same competencies and skills as our own UK-trained consultants.

Health Service (Nottingham)

16. Mr. Graham Allen (Nottingham, North) (Lab): If he or one of his Ministers will attend the Nottingham health network conference on 12 November to listen to the health concerns of the local community. [177300]

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Health (Dr. Stephen Ladyman): The Under-Secretary of State for Health, my hon. Friend the Member for Welwyn Hatfield (Miss Johnson), is considering an invitation to that event.

Mr. Allen: I put on record my thanks for the way in which the Government have bolstered the local health service, especially by providing the highest ever number of nurses and doctors in our two hospitals in the city of Nottingham and by putting additional money into our primary care trust. However, in view of the appalling statistics that the Under-Secretary recently revealed about high levels of infant mortality and poor levels of sexual education, among many other things, will my hon. Friend urge her, or another ministerial colleague, to attend the Nottingham, North health conference to put on record what still needs to be done, despite the Government's excellent record?

Dr. Ladyman: My hon. Friend is right. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary will seriously consider the possibility of attending the conference. I emphasise that the ministerial team has attended 152 official engagements already this year. We are certainly consulting people in the field and we perceive no issue as more important than health inequalities and the need to ensure the provision of equal standards of care to everybody, everywhere.

 
8 Jun 2004 : Column 143
 

 
8 Jun 2004 : Column 145
 

Point of Order

12.30 pm

Mr. George Foulkes (Carrick, Cumnock and Doon Valley) (Lab/Co-op): On a point of order, Mr. Speaker. I wish to make a sincere and abject personal apology to my hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell) for calling him a Jonah yesterday. Of course, I should have said a Jeremiah, as I am sure you realised immediately, Mr. Speaker, as did one or two of my colleagues.

---