§ Dr. Gibson:To ask the Secretary of State for Health what recent meetings Ministers (a)have had and (b) are planning with (i) nursing, (ii) clinical, (iii) voluntary sector and (iv) service user organisations about the development of cancer nursing to meet (A) current and (B) projected demand for cancer nursing within the NHS. [123249]
§ Miss Melanie Johnson:I will be meeting my hon. Friend on 29 October 2003, to discuss cancer nursing.
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§ Mrs. Curtis-Thomas:To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will make a statement on progress towards meeting targets on cancer care. [129486]
§ Miss Melanie Johnson:Thanks to major additional investment and the hard work of those working in the national health service we are making real progress in implementing the NHS Cancer Plan. Patients are benefiting from improvements across all aspects of cancer care.
For example there are an extra 1,000 cancer consultants compared with 1997; nearly 99 per cent. of people with suspected cancer are now seen by a specialist within two weeks of being referred by their general practitioner; we have improved the quality of breast screening by the introduction of two view mammography and have extended the breast screening service to include women aged 65 to 70 resulting in nearly 200,000 extra women being invited since April 2001. The introduction of the National Institute for Clinical Excellence has meant that over 31,000 extra patients can benefit from new cancer drugs. We have increased the NHS funding of specialist palliative care by £50 million a year, an increase of nearly 40 per cent. and latest figures show a reduction of 9 per cent. in the death rate from cancer.