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20 Mar 2008 : Column 1318W—continued

Patients: EC Action

Sandra Gidley: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment he has made of the likely effects of the European Commission’s legislative proposal on information to patients; and if he will make a statement. [195396]

Dawn Primarolo: The Government are currently considering their response to the European Commission’s legal proposal on information to patients and seeking views from stakeholders including industry and patient organisations. The consultation is intended to inform the development of future legal proposals and as such, no impact assessment has been undertaken at this stage.

The Government support the development of improved frameworks for the delivery of medicines information across Europe to ensure that all patients have access to high quality, non-promotional information to help them make decisions about their health care. The statement in the consultation that the ban on direct-to-consumer advertising of prescription only medicines will remain is in line with long-standing United Kingdom policy and we will work to ensure that this important principle is maintained as the Commission’s proposals develop.


20 Mar 2008 : Column 1319W

Patients: Nutrition

Mr. Stephen O'Brien: To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) what consideration was given to including indicators of undernutrition in the list of vital signs in his Department's Operational Plans 2008-09 to 2010-11 on 31 January 2008; and if he will make a statement; [189583]

(2) for what reasons indicators of undernutrition were not included in the list of vital signs published in his Department's Operational Plans 2008-09 to 2010-11. [190250]

Dawn Primarolo: The range of indicators of vital signs published in the ‘Operational Plans 2008-09 - 2010-11’ (January 2008) reflect national priorities set out in ‘The NHS in England: The Operating Framework for 2008-09’ (December 2007) and the Department's contribution to cross-Government public service agreements. A copy of the framework is available in the Library.

We considered a wide range of existing indicators to support the development of the vital signs, and did this with the involvement of external stakeholders and an on-line engagement processes.

Plastic Surgery

Sandra Gidley: To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) how many elective cosmetic surgical operations there were, broken down by (a) trust and (b) type of operation in each of the last five years; [195398]

(2) what estimate he has made of the number of privately-funded cosmetic surgery procedures which required remedial treatment by the NHS in each of the last five years. [195399]

Mr. Bradshaw: This information is not collected centrally.

Sexually Transmitted Diseases

Sandra Gidley: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many cases of drug resistant gonorrhoea have been confirmed in each of the last five years, broken down by trust. [194441]

Dawn Primarolo: Data are not available by individual trusts. The Gonococcal Resistance to Antimicrobial Surveillance Programme (GRASP) monitors gonococcal antimicrobial resistance at 26 sentinel sites in England and Wales.

The number of patients attending genito-urinary medicine (GUM) clinics with confirmed gonorrhoea isolates submitted to GRASP for sensitivity testing in the last five years are presented in the following table.


20 Mar 2008 : Column 1320W
Number of GUM patients with confirmed gonorrhoea isolates submitted to GRASP for sensitivity testing, 2002-06
Number patients with confirmed gonorrhoea isolates submitted to GRASP for sensitivity testing

2002

2,204

2003

1,977

2004

1,795

2005

965

2006

1,242

Source:
GRASP

The percentages of patients with gonorrhoea isolates submitted to GRASP which had confirmed resistance to penicillin, tetracycline, ciprofloxacin, azithromycin, spectinomycin, ceftriaxone and cefixime in the last five years are presented in the following table.

Percentage of isolates from patients resistant to specific antimicrobials, 2002-06
Percentage
Antimicrobial 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006

Penicillin (MIC>=l mg/l)

9.8

9.7

11.4

17.9

9.5

Tetracycline (MIC>=2 mg/l)

44.8

38.2

44.4

48.0

36.9

Ciprofloxacin (MIC>=l mg/l)

9.8

9.1

14.0

21.7

26.5

Azithromycin (MIC>=l mg/l)

0.4

0.9

1.8

2.2

2.0

Spectinomycin (MIC>=128 mg/l)

0.0

0.0

0.2

0.0

0.0

Notes:
1. Since GRASP is a sentinel programme we cannot provide data at the level of primary care trusts.
2. MIC means Minimum Inhibitory Concentration and is defined as the lowest concentration of an antimicrobial that will inhibit the visible growth of a micro-organism after overnight incubation. The MICs shown for the specific antimicrobials define the cut-off for resistance to these antimicrobials.
3. Due to variations in the retrieval and confirmation of isolates submitted to Sexually Transmitted Bacteria Reference Laboratory of the Health Protection Agency in 2005, the data on resistance prevalence are statistically weighted. This is done to avoid resistance estimates being under representative of sites that have a low retrieval rate and over representative of sites that have a high retrieval rate. Consequently, estimates for previous years have been recalculated in this way and so values presented here may differ slightly from to the unweighted estimates that have appeared in previous GRASP reports.
4. The data presented for the percentage of isolates from patients resistant to specific antimicrobials, 2002-06, represent specimens collected from GUM clinics only.
5. No isolates have been found with resistance to ceftriaxone or cefixime over the last five years.
Source:
GRASP

Damian Green: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how much his Department has allocated to (a) Eastern and Coastal Kent primary care trust (PCT) and its predecessor PCTs and (b) PCTs with a similar sexually transmitted infection prevalence for sexual health services in each of the last five years; and what the average sexual health allocation was for PCTs in England in each year. [195152]

Dawn Primarolo: The funding to support sexual health services is not allocated separately to primary care trusts (PCTs) but is contained within the mainstream revenue allocations made to PCTs. A weighted capitation formula is used to determine each
20 Mar 2008 : Column 1321W
PCT's share of available funding. It is the responsibility of PCTs to commission the health services they need to meet the health requirements of the local populations they serve.

The revenue allocations made to Eastern and Coastal Kent PCT for the period 2003-04 to 2008-09 are provided in the following table.


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Eastern and Coastal Kent PCT
Allocation (£000)

2003-04

643,780

2004-05

704,384

2005-06

769,650

2006-07

917,451

2007-08

1,013,331

2008-09

1,068,679


Dan Rogerson: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many sexually transmitted infections were diagnosed in each year since 1997, broken down by type of infection. [195797]

Dawn Primarolo: The total number of new sexually transmitted infections (STIs) diagnosed in genito-urinary medicine (GUM) clinics in England between 1997 and 2006 is given in the following table.


20 Mar 2008 : Column 1323W

20 Mar 2008 : Column 1324W
The total number of new STIs diagnosed in GUM clinics in England; 1997 to 2006
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006

Primary and secondary infectious syphilis

147

131

211

322

717

1,196

1,538

2,033

2,574

2,515

Uncomplicated gonorrhoea

12,399

12,535

15,549

20,494

22,398

24,357

23,492

20,779

17,702

17,445

Complicated gonococcal infection including pelvic inflammatory disease (PID) and epididymitis

260

261

311

339

368

378

414

397

329

324

Chancroid/ lymphogranuloma venereum/ Donovanosis

50

67

51

61

62

71

136

149

317

252

Uncomplicated chlamydial infection

38,839

43,912

50,960

61,370

68,180

78,117

85,516

92,948

95,930

99,230

Complicated chlamydial infection including PID and epididymitis

1,625

1,852

2,195

2,642

2,619

2,705

2,728

2,964

2,959

2,950

Uncomplicated non-gonococcal/ non-specific urethritis males, or treatment of mucopurulent cervicitis in females

48,677

51,951

53,214

56,007

59,467

62,040

73,928

77,287

77,777

77,362

Complicated infection (non-chlamydial/non-gonococcal) including PID and epididymitis

11,512

12,289

13,236

14,297

14,656

15,198

14,708

16,876

16,994

17,162

Trichomoniasis

5,968

6,175

6,089

6,767

7,012

7,196

6,509

6,221

5,388

5,521

Scabies/ pediculosis pubis

6,107

6,070

5,811

5,761

5,126

4,299

3,562

2,813

2,179

2,188

Genital herpes simplex—first attack

15,079

15,815

15,880

16,147

17,054

17,510

17,157

16,952

17,618

19,388

Genital warts—first attack

58,711

59,681

61,157

60,661

62,423

63,938

65,279

68,217

68,701

70,988

Molluscum contagiosum

6,197

6,736

7,400

7,791

8,574

9,437

10,425

11,937

13,085

14,099

New HIV diagnoses(1): asymptomatic

1,488

1,455

1,636

1,854

2,764

4,279

4,762

4,823

4,888

4,439

New HIV diagnoses(2): symptomatic (not AIDS)

1,114

758

709

668

967

1,189

1,105

1,054

1,177

981

AIDS: first presentation—new HIV diagnosis(1)

313

333

376

279

Total new STI diagnoses

208,173

219,688

234,409

255,181

272,387

291,910

311,572

325,783

327,994

335,123

(1) “AIDS: first presentation—new HIV diagnosis” was added to the KC60 form in 2003.
(2) Data on new HIV diagnoses are included in the table to ensure the numbers of ‘total new ST1 diagnoses’ match published data. More comprehensive data on total new HIV diagnoses in England are collected through a different surveillance system that also includes non-GUM clinic settings. They are available on the HPA website at:
www.hpa.org.uk/infections/topics_az/hiv_and_sti/Stats/HIV/NewDiagnoses/Files/2007_Country_England.pdf
Notes:
1. The data available from the KC60 statutory returns are for diagnoses made in GUM clinics only. Diagnoses made in other clinical settings, such as general practice, are not recorded in the KC60 dataset.
2. The data available from the KC60 statutory returns are the number of diagnoses made, not the number of patients diagnosed. For example, individuals may be diagnosed with chlamydia several times in one year and each diagnosis will be counted separately.
3. The information provided has been adjusted for missing clinic data.
4. Data are not yet available for 2007.

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