House of Commons Debate - Cumberlege Report (3 February 2022)

Summary

This is the transcript of a Westminster Hall debate in the House of Commons on fulfilling the recommendations of the Cumberlege Report.

Content

The Independent Medicines and Medical Devices Safety (IMMDS) Review

The IMMDS Review, chaired by Baroness Julia Cumberlege, examined the response of the healthcare system in England to the harmful side effects of three medical interventions: Hormone pregnancy tests, Sodium valproate and Pelvic mesh implants. These interventions had resulted in a truly shocking degree of avoidable harm to patients over a period of decades.

This Review resulted in the publication of the First Do No Harm report (also known as the Cumberlege Report) on the 9 July 2020, which outlined findings from this Review and made a number of recommendations to improve patient safety. In July 2021, the Government formally responded in full to this report, accepting four of its over-arching recommendations, accepting two in part, accepting one in principle, and rejecting two.

Westminster Hall Debate

Key points raised in the debate included:

• Calls by numerous MPs for the Government to re-consider its stance rejecting the Cumbelege Report’s recommendation to create a new independent redress agency.
• Concerns about the accessibility of specialist mesh centres and that in some cases women were being asked to have their mesh removed by the same surgeon who inserted it.
• The importance of ensuring that the new Patient Safety Commissioner is fully independent from the Department of Health and Social Care.
• Calls by numerous MPs for the Government to re-consider its stance rejecting the Cumberlege Report’s recommendation to establish separate redress schemes for those affected by Hormone pregnancy tests, Sodium valproate and Pelvic mesh implants.
• Related to the lack of a redress scheme, concerns about the availability of support for parents of children impacted by foetal valproate syndrome.

Follow the link here or at the bottom of the page to read the full transcript.

Related reading

•  A year on from the Cumberlege Review: Initial reflections on the Government’s response (Patient Safety Learning, 23 July 2021)
• Primodos, mesh and sodium valproate: Recommendations and the UK Government’s response (Sharon Hartles, 9 August 2021)
• Response to the report of the Independent Medicines and Medical Devices Safety Review (Independent Report of the Patient Reference Group, 21 July 2021)
• Regulatory flaws: Women were catastrophically failed in the mesh, Primodos and Sodium Valproate tragedies (Kath Sansom, 15 April 2021)
• Virtual public meeting on redress (All-Party Parliamentary Group for First Do No Harm, 26 January 2022)