HC Deb 22 July 1988 vol 137 cc882-3W
Ms. Walley

To ask the Secretary of State for Social Services what independent research has been or is being undertaken by or for his Department into instances of child cancers in the age ranges(a) 0 to 15 years and (b) 15 to 24 years throughout the United Kingdom and particularly in Humberside; and if he will make a statement.

Mrs. Currie

In relation to childhod cancer, United Kingdom health departments have funded, or have agreed in principle to take forward, recommendations 1, 2, 3 and 4 of the independent advisory group report "Investigation of the Possible Increased Incidence of Cancer in West Cumbria" (Her Majesty's Stationery Office 1984). and recommendations 1, 2, 3 and 8 of the second COMARE report "Investigation of the possible increased incidence of leukaemia in young people near the Dounreay Nuclear Establishment, Caithness, Scotland" (Her Majesty's Stationery Office 1988). Copies of both reports are in the Library. In addition, the Department's directly com missioned research programme includes: (i)the maintenance of the national registry of childhood cancer at the childhood cancer research group, Oxford university. The group is also in receipt of joint funding from this Department and the National Radiological Protection Board for the further development of the national medical statistical databases for childhood cancers in Great Britain. a case control study of childhood cancers in west Berkshire and Basingstoke and north Hampshire.

In relation to Humberside, the East Yorkshie health authority commissioned a report (Report on childhood cancer aggregation in the Beverley and Kingston-upon-Hull administrative districts) earlier this year on the incidence of childhood cancers in certain areas in the east Yorkshire borough of Beverley, and the city of Hull. This report has recently been published and is being studied by the Department.