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Published: Tuesday, 11 August 2020 07:59

Written by News Editor

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From Australia comes news that oral health is suffering during the pandemic. Meanwhile questions were asked in both the House of Commons and the Lords on dentistry during the Covid-19 pandemic, but received far from satisfactory answers. The BDA’s website is still down, so there have been no updates from them.

Oral health in Australia

Tooth decay and gum disease are increasing among Australian adults — a trend made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic. Australians are avoiding the dentist due to fears of proximity to others, job losses resulting in people spending less on their health and people stuck at home eating high-sugar foods more regularly.

According to the Australian Dental Association’s (ADA’s) Adult Oral Health Tracker progress report, Australian adults are keeping their teeth for longer, but one in three is walking around with untreated tooth decay, while one in four has periodontal disease with periodontal pockets 4 mm or deeper.

“The results are in, (for The Oral Health Tracker 2020) and for gum disease and tooth decay, they’re not good,” said Australian Dental Association Oral Health Promoter Dr Mikaela Chinotti. “COVID-19 is only making this worse. We’re anticipating a spike in the number of tooth decay and other oral health issues to emerge once the pandemic is over.”

Questions in Parliament

Royston Smith, Conservative MP for Southampton Itchen, asked how many patients had accessed emergency dental service during the covid-19 lockdown. Secondly, he asked what estimate the Department had made of the number of patients that will require dental treatment in the next six months; and what the average number of patients requiring dental treatment was in each of the last five years.

Replying junior health minister, Jo Churchill, said that data was not currently available on the number of patients that accessed emergency dental services during the lockdown. Plus, data was not collected in the format requested. NHS England was responsible for commissioning primary care dentistry to meet local need. They had announced on 28 May that NHS dentistry outside urgent care centres would begin to restart from 8 June with the aim of increasing levels of service as fast as is compatible with maximising safety.

In the House of Lords Lib Dem peer, Baroness Harris of Richmond, asked whether it was within the Chief Dental Officer for England’s remit to instruct all dental practices to cease face to face consultations when the restrictions for the pandemic were introduced.

Replying minister Lord Bethell said that NHS England had published guidance on 25 March 2020 instructing all general dental services and community dental services to suspend routine care and all face to face urgent care, unless delivered through an urgent dental centre. It was their responsibility to make decisions on provision of the NHS services it commissions. He concluded: “Decisions are made by NHS England and NHS Improvement as a whole taking into account both clinical and commissioner advice.”

Retired dentist, Baroness Gardner of Parkes, asked what steps the Government were taking to increase the availability of NHS dental treatment for patients of all ages. Lord Bethell replied that NHS dental practices were able to restart face-to-face care from 8 June, with the aim of increasing levels of service for all patients, as fast as is safely possible. Urgent dental care centres remained open to support the provision of urgent and emergency face-to-face care for dental patients and patients will be referred to urgent dental care centres, where needed locally.

Questions on the supply of PPE for dentists came from Lord Redesdale (Lib Dem), Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Labour) – 3 questions - and Baroness Harris of Richmond. Lord Bethell referred them all to an information factsheet on PPE which had been placed in the House of Lords library.

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