§ Mr. SheermanTo ask the Secretary of State for Health how much was spent on health campaigns aimed at promoting greater awareness of prostate cancer in each of the past 10 years. [130387]
§ Yvette CooperIt is not possible to provide information in the form requested. A number of campaigns have covered both prostate cancer awareness and other issues and the sums spent on prostate cancer cannot be disaggregated from the total.
The Department provides information for the public, in leaflets and through health education campaigns. These encourage people to report to their general practitioner or other health professional any persistent or unusual symptoms which may indicate cancer or other disease.
We encourage early detection of prostate cancer and have announced that, by December 2000, all urgent general practitioner referrals of suspected cases should be seen by a consultant within two weeks of referral.
Little research has been carried out worldwide into prevention of prostate cancer and detection. In June, my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State announced an extra £1 million to fund two new research projects. The first of these will be examining the acceptability of the treatment and diagnosis options to men who are randomly offered testing. The second project is looking at innovative new detection and treatment techniques.
We have also invested £200,000 from the Public Health Development Fund to develop, pilot and evaluate an education programme on prostate cancer especially the risks associated with screening and testing. This money will also go towards developing other materials aimed at changing attitudes among men to facilitate early detection and prevention of cancer.
We are in the early stages of developing a prostate cancer action plan which we will consult on. The plan will set out the current position on research, diagnosis and treatment of prostate cancer and will propose recommendations for future action.