House of Lords debates child oral health
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- Published: Thursday, 14 December 2017 07:37
- Written by News Editor
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A question from Baroness Benjamin sparked a short debate on child oral health in the House of Lords. Replying to the questions was junior health minister, Lord O'Shaughnessy, who stuck to the party line and promised that an evaluation report of prototyping is due to be published in the new year.
Baroness (Floella) Benjamin had asked what action the Government was taking to ‘address the problem of child tooth decay, in the light of the finding by Public Health England in its most recent oral health survey that 25 per cent of five year olds had experienced dental decay’.
The minister replied that “Public Health England, NHS England and the Department of Health are working together to improve children’s oral health. For example, the “Starting Well” initiative will support outreach to children not currently seeing a dentist in the areas of highest need, while dental contract reform supports our longer-term aim for all care to have a preventive focus. Furthermore, we are taking steps to reduce the amount of sugar consumed by children.”
Baroness Benjamin asked further whether the Government therefore would ‘consider taking further action by introducing supervised tooth-brushing sessions in all nurseries, as they do in Scotland, to improve oral health education for all our children?’
The Minister replied that ‘Supervised tooth-brushing is part of the “Starting Well” programme, but Public Health England and local authorities are responsible for commissioning and will look at the results to see whether it can be rolled out into general dentistry practice.’
Several members, including retired dentist Baroness Gardner of Parkes, asked about fluoridation, but the minister replied that this was a matter for local authorities to decide.
Another retired dentist, Lord Colwyn asked about the current ‘target-driven’ dental contract introduced in 2006. He said “The Government committed to reforming it in their 2010 manifesto, but progress has been very slow. The latest reports speak of a national rollout no earlier than 2021. We urgently need a new contract that rewards prevention. Does my noble friend not agree that patients and dentists should not have to wait so long?”
The minister agreed that preventive care was important. “Pilot schemes have been going on in 75 practices to look at incentivising preventive care and population care. I understand that an evaluation report of that first full year of prototyping is due to be published in the new year.”
Two novel questions came from Lord Bradshaw (Lib Dem) who suggested asking manufacturers of sugary cereals to include in the packet a free toothbrush and Lord Lexden (Con) who thought that part of the answer to the problem lay in that attractive four-letter word “milk”?
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