§ Mr. Ashleyasked the Secretary of State for Social Services if he will detail the support his Department is giving to the campaign by the National Rubella Council to promote vaccination for adult women.
§ Mr. HayhoeIn addition to the Department's annual grant to the Council to support its headquarter's expenses, the council's efforts to reach adult women who may be at risk from congenital rubella syndrome are also fully supported. The Government-funded Health Education Council has funded the leaflets and posters issued by the National Rubella Council which are aimed specifically at adult women and has given the Council a grant of £5,000 towards the recently-launched video film "Why Worry?" which I hope will be seen widely by women's groups.
§ Mr. Ashleyasked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many rubella vaccinations were given in the last year for which figures are available to (a) school children and (b) adult women; and if he will categorise the adult women according to whether they were vaccinated in (i) hospital, (ii) family planning clinics, (iii) general practitioners surgeries, (iv) occupational health centres and (v) other places.
§ Mr. HayhoeIn 1984, the latest year for which figures are available, the number of schoolgirls in England in the 10 to 14 age group who were vaccinated was 308,000. Information about the numbers of adult women is not at present available centrally.
§ Mr. Ashleyasked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many reported cases there were of rubella in the last five years for which figures are available.
§ Mr. HayhoeI regret that this information is riot available centrally
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§ Mr. Ashleyasked the Secretary of State for Social Services how many babies, identified as having been damaged as a result of their mother contracting rubella, were born in each of the last five years.
§ Mr. HayhoeThe numbers of confirmed or suspected cases of congenital rubella infection reported to the national congenital rubella surveillance programme were:
Year Number 1981 13 1982 23 1983 37 1984 23 1985 n.a. n.a. Not available. These figures may require adjustment if further cases are identified.
§ Mr. Ashleyasked the Secretary of State for Social Services what has been the average take-up of rubella vaccination by schoolgirls in each of the last five years.
§ Mr. HayhoeThe available information for England is as follows:
Percentage of Schoolgirls Vaccinated by the end of the Year in which they reached age 14 Per cent 1980 84 1981 84 1982 83 1983 84 1984 86
§ Mr. Ashleyasked the Secretary of State for Social Services what advice his Department has issued regarding screening for immunity to rubella for adult women, pregnant and otherwise; and how his Department monitors whether the advice is followed.
§ Mr. HayhoeThe Department's Chief Medical Officer wrote to all general practitioners and district medical officers in 1983 asking them to take all possible steps to ensure that women of childbearing age are immune to rubella. This advice is repeated in the Memorandum "Immunisation against Infectious Disease" issued to doctors. The public health laboratory service has been commissioned by the Department to report on serological testing for rubella antibodies in its laboratories. These tests numbered 650,000 in 1984, compared to 522,000 in 1981.