HC Deb 05 March 1991 vol 187 cc130-1
12. Mr. Sayeed

To ask the Secretary of State for Health what proportion of general practitioners are receiving the higher target payments for cervical screening in the south-west region.

14. Mr. Knapman

To ask the Secretary of State for Health what proportion of general practitioners are receiving the higher target payments for childhood immunisation and vaccination in the south-west region.

Mrs. Virginia Bottomley

As at 1 April 1990, 79 per cent. of general practitioners in the south western region qualified for higher target payments for cervical screening, and for childhood immunisation and vaccination. I congratulate all those involved on this excellent achievement.

Mr. Sayeed

Does my hon. Friend agree that although cost-benefit analysis shows that not all preventive medicine is worth the resources spent on it, cervical screening is an area in which money is well spent? That shows clearly one of the benefits to patients of the new general practitioner contract.

Mrs. Bottomley

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. He is exactly right. About 2,000 deaths a year occur as a result of cervical cancer. It is estimated that 80 per cent. of those could be saved by regular cervical cancer screening. It is a practical example of the success of the general practitioner contract, which is providing not only more services to women, such as well-woman clinics and health promotion clinics, and more services for all the family, such as child surveillance and minor surgery, but improved availability of and accessibility to general practitioners.

Mr. Knapman

Does my hon. Friend accept that she has given another clear example of the steps that the Government are taking towards improving the health of young children?

Mrs. Bottomley

I do, indeed, on a number of fronts. Children are now saved from avoidable diseases from which there was no redress in days gone by. The number of mothers dying in childbirth has halved and the number of children surviving at birth has never been higher. I can inform my hon. Friend that the safest place to be born now is Huntingdon, where there is a record figure of 5.8 per 1,000 perinatal mortality.

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