Health Secretary Wes Stree (Image: Getty)
Health Secretary Wes Streeting has vowed he will keep his “promise” to transform fracture services across England as part of the battle against osteoporosis.
Mr Streeting doubled-down on his pre-election pledge to end the postcode lottery so everyone has access to the potentially life-saving services by 2030.
The Health Secretary praised the “unmissable” Better Bones campaign run by the Sunday Express and the Royal Osteoporosis Society, saying the services we have campaigned for will end up saving taxpayers cash.
Osteoporosis causes 500,000 broken bones every year in the UK at a cost of more than £4.5billion.
Today, only half of England’s NHS trusts have a “fracture liaison service” – a specialist clinic that will identify, assess and treat anyone who breaks a bone after age 50. Campaigners say this means two out of three people who need anti-osteoporosis medications missing out on these.
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Mr Streeting insisted he remains committed to ensuring everyone has access to such a service.
He said Labour had been “persuaded” by the campaign in Opposition, adding: “We’ve made the promise, and now we will keep the promise.”
The Labour rising star stated that the clinics “aren’t just good for patients” but are “a service to the taxpayer as well through saving money”
Health Minister Andrew Gwynne also backed the Better Bones campaign and pledged continued support, saying he was a “big supporter”.
Signalling that important announcements are coming, he said that “when it comes down to political will, you’ll find none better than Wes Streeting and myself pushing this agenda, so hopefully we will have some good news soon”.
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Campaigners want funding for the roll-out of fracture liaison services to be announced in the October Budget.
Craig Jones, chief executive of the Royal Osteoporosis Society, said: “It’s taken this long to get these vital, life-changing services set up because of a political deadlock between the health department, the Treasury and the NHS over who should fund them. We need political will to break the deadlock.”
He said he had left last week’s Labour conference with “high hopes that Wes Streeting and Andrew Gwynne are the two leaders who are going to finally get people with osteoporosis the early diagnosis they need”.
Earlier this year, Mr Streeting explained why this issue meant to much to him personally, saying: “It’s something I feel very strongly about. A relative of mine had a stroke last year and when she returned home she had been there only a matter of days when she had a fall and broke her hip because of her osteoporosis.”
He said that if she had had access to a fracture liaison service “her experience might have been very different”.According to the Royal Osteoporosis Society, people with broken bones living in an area without this kind of service are “fixed up in A&E and forgotten about, without their underlying osteoporosis being diagnosed and treated”. This means that “many then re-fracture with devastating consequences”.