§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what contingency arrangements have been made for the Ambulance Service in the event of millennium compliance failure. [23639]
§ Mr. MilburnThe National Health Service Executive's Year 2000 Programme are working to eliminate risk through the identification and management of potential risks.
364WIt is a priority for NHS Organisations to develop contingency plans and an Ambulance Service forum is being established, through NHS regional offices, to address the issues.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what estimate he has made of the cost of millennium compliance for the Ambulance Service. [23640]
§ Mr. MilburnNo estimates have been made.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Health by what date all(a) kidney dialysis machines, (b) intensive care cots for premature babies and (c) intensive care equipment will be millennium compliant; and what will be the cost of compliance. [23646]
§ Mr. MilburnBy 31 December 1998 each separate National Health Service organisation should have completed major activities where all critical systems are ready and fully tested, or detailed plans made for coping with those systems or equipment that cannot be repaired or replaced in time.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Health when he expects to be able to estimate accurately the costs of millennium compliance in the NHS. [23644]
§ Mr. MilburnInformation should be available by end of April 1998.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Health when he wrote to suppliers to the NHS reminding them of the necessity for all equipment to be millennium compliant; and if he will place a copy of the letter in the Library and list the names of suppliers he has sent it to and the date it was sent. [23645]
§ Mr. MilburnThe Medical Devices Agency wrote in 1996, and again in 1997, to the main United Kingdom trade associations concerned with medical devices. This has been followed up with a letter to many individual manufacturers. The National Health Service Supplies Authority are in the process of writing to approximately 4,000 supplier organisations with whom the NHS has a national contract. The letter will be sent by 31 January 1998.
The NHS Executive wrote in October 1997 to 30 leading suppliers of Information Systems to the acute and community trusts and the main suppliers of general practitioner systems. Copies of letters and addressees will be placed in the Library.
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Health how many officials, and at what grade, are working on millennium compliance issues. [23641]
§ Mr. MilburnThe Department of Health, including its agencies, currently employs a total of 44 full time equivalent members of staff of various grades on Year 2000 related work. The Year 2000 programme within the Department of Health is co-ordinated by the head of the Applications Development and Support branch, who reports to the senior Departmental information technology steering committee.
365W
§ Mrs. GillanTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what resources are being made available to the NHS's Adverse Incident Centre to deal with any failures to systems through millennium compliance failures. [23638]
§ Ms JowellThe Medical Devices Agency expects the majority of medical devices to be millennium compliant already. Therefore the number of adverse incidents involving millennium compliance failures is likely to be low. As the number of reports involving millennium compliance failures is expected to be a small fraction of the total number of adverse incident reports, we see no need to allocate extra resources to the Adverse Incident Centre to deal specifically with millennium compliance failures.