§ Mrs. BeckettTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what was the budget for health promotional activities on cot death in each of the last five years; and what is the projected budget for the next two years.
1991–92 £000s 1992–93 £000s 1993–94 £000s 1994–95 £000s 1995–96 £000s 1996–97 £000s DH Expenditure Cot Death 1,611 — 21 30 — — HEA Expenditure Teenage Smoking Campaign 2,101 2,650 2,650 1,362 — — Smoking in Pregnancy 500 500 500 446 — — Adult Smoking - 5,438 8,256 8,052 4,000 4,000 Birth to Five 253 21 77 1107 — — Pregnancy Book 326 328 151 1196 — — Total 4,791 9,147 11,655 10,193 4,000 4,000 1 Provisional figures for the year to date. Further expenditure is planned to the end of the current financial year. The Department of Health budgets for 1995–96 and 1996–97 and most of those for the HEA have yet to be agreed.
Departmental expenditure in 1991 went towards a press and television cot death campaign, as well as the production and distribution of a departmental leaflet, "Reducing the Risk of Cot Death", which has since been reprinted and almost 5 million copies distributed so far.
The recently announced national anti-smoking campaign managed by the HEA over the next three financial years will be primarily aimed at adults, and especially parents of young children. This is particularly relevant to cot death because smoking is a major risk factor associated with it. The HEA's two major publications in this field, the "Pregnancy Book", given free to first-time mothers and "Birth to Five", given free to first-time parents, both contain advice on reducing the risk of cot death.
Much health promotion work of this type is carried out by local health care units and health authorities. It is not possible to quantify this either in terms of time or cost. Health promotion activity aimed at pregnant women and new mothers is carried out in face-to-face contacts by individual midwives, health visitors, general practitioners, obstetricians and paediatricians during the course of routine care.
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§ Mr. Malone[holding answer 13 January 1995]: Details of budgets allocated to general practitioner fundholders and district health authorities are shown in the table. General practitioner fundholder data include allocations for drugs and staff in addition to the hospital and community health services that they can purchase.
§ Mr. Sackville[holding answer 13 January 1995]: The table shows the amounts that the Department has spent on publicity aimed specifically at reducing the risk of cot death since the introduction of the "Back to Sleep" campaign in December 1991 and Health Education Authority initiatives aimed at reducing smoking prevalence in district groups.
With the efforts of all those health professionals and the success of those initiatives, there has been a remarkable reduction in the number of cot deaths. In England and Wales over the period 1988–1993, we are pleased to say that the numbers have fallen by more than 70 per cent.