§ Mr. HarveyTo ask the Secretary of State for Health what assessment he has made of(a) the average cost to the NHS of treating someone with meningitis C, (b) the number of people who were treated in the last year for meningitis C by the NHS, (c) the annual cost of treatment for meningitis C by the NHS and (d) the cost of giving one vaccination for meningitis C, including (i) costs of publicising the availability of the vaccine and (ii) other costs for which figures are available; and if he will make a statement. [125035]
§ Yvette Cooper[holding answer 9 June 2000]: The average cost per hospital admission for a patient with meningococcal Group C disease is estimated at £3,200. However, information on the full cost of National Health Service treatment, including post- and pre-hospital admission costs and the cost of caring for those patients with long term sequelae arising from meningococcal Group C disease, is not available.
In the year July 1998 to June 1999 there were an estimated 1,500 cases of meningococcal Group C disease in England and Wales; about 150 of these patients died.
The cost of meningococcal Group C vaccine is commercially confidential. However, at the end of the current meningococcal Group C immunisation programme we hope to be able to give an aggregate cost for the whole programme including vaccine purchase, distribution, implementation, information and publicity.
The new meningococcal Group C conjugate vaccine is already having a welcome effect on this deadly disease. Early reports show that the number of cases of meningococcal infection in those groups who have been immunised has been dramatically reduced, with a reduction on the expected number of cases of around 75 per cent. The United Kingdom is the first country in the world to benefit from this new vaccine, putting the UK in the forefront of tackling this devastating disease and signalling a great success for the NHS.