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The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-01-28.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what the budget (a) allocated from central Government to and (b) awarded by the Small Business Research Initiative for healthcare was in each financial year since its inception.

George Freeman

The Department has run a number of competitions under the Small Business Research Initiative (SBRI) and has had a budget as follows: fiscal year 2012-13 £2 million; fiscal 2013-14 £5 million; fiscal 2014-15 £2 million and fiscal 2015-16 £6 million. The Department has awarded contracts valued as follows:

2012-13: £1.07 million, the Department also contributed £1 million to other health related SBRI competitions.

2013-14: £5.59 million

2014-15: £10.15 million

It should be noted that SBRI is now firmly embedded within NHS England’s Small Business Research Initiative for Healthcare (SBRI Healthcare). Hence, the Department has not launched any new competitions since 2013.

SBRI Healthcare was established in 2013 by NHS England. As such, NHS England is responsible for setting this programme’s budget, which it has done as follows: fiscal year 2013-14 £10 million; fiscal 2014-15 £20 million; fiscal 2015-16 £20 million. The budget, once allocated to SBRI Healthcare, is then delegated to the Academic Health Science Networks to manage the implementation of the programme.

NHS England has awarded contracts valued as follows:

2013-14: £13.49 million

2014-15: £22.29 million

2015-16: £15.94 million to-date.

Further assessments are due to take place this month which could result in additional awards of around £1.6 million.

The level of investment in SBRI Healthcare reflects NHS England’s ongoing commitment to promoting innovation in the National Health Service and United Kingdom economic growth.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-01-28.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what recent discussions he has had with his European counterparts on the Zika virus.

Jane Ellison

The Secretary of State regularly discusses matters across his portfolio with his European counterparts. He continues to closely monitor the situation on the Zika virus. Additionally, Departmental officials continue to discuss the development of the virus with relevant European colleagues, and will be participating in a European Health Security Committee meeting on Zika on Tuesday 9 February 2016.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-01-28.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, how many students began podiatry courses in the last three years; what assessment he has made of the reasons for trends in those numbers; and what steps his Department is taking to increase the number of applicants to such courses.

Ben Gummer

This table shows the planned number of podiatry courses available in the last three years, and the actual take up of those training places.

Year	2013/14	2014/15	2015/16
Podiatry (planned)	365	362	362
Podiatry (actual)	339	345	–

Source: multi professional education and training budget monitoring returns

The number of podiatry students taking up courses for 2015/16 is not yet available.

The Health Education England (HEE) annual Workforce Plan for England 2016/17 will be published by the end of February 2016.

Ministers hold regular discussions with HEE on a broad range of workforce supply issues and puts out an annual Mandate to HEE setting its priorities for the coming year.

The HEE commissioning and investment plan – 2016/17 includes a forecast increase in supply of podiatrists in the National Health Service workforce of 36.4% by 2020 which is an additional 1,084 full time equivalents coming out of training.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-01-28.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what discussions he has had with Ministers of the Cabinet Office on the Zika virus.

Jane Ellison

My Rt. hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Health regularly discusses matters across his portfolio with Ministers from the Cabinet Office and other Government departments. He will continue to closely monitor the Zika virus situation.

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Andrew Gwynne on 2016-01-28.

To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what additional training has been provided to (a) NHS England and (b) Public Health England personnel on the Zika virus.

Jane Ellison

NHS England continues to work closely with Public Health England (PHE) and Government Departments to ensure appropriate advice is provided to the National Health Service in England in line with the current risk assessment. PHE will provide guidance and information specifically targeted at primary care and this will be available shortly. PHE has also produced regular briefing notes for local health protection teams who have been asked to share this with local NHS.

PHE has raised awareness about Zika virus among public health and clinical colleagues within PHE by circulating a briefing note to all staff. This will support clinicians to identify, investigate and manage cases that may present in clinical practice. The briefing note included information about the outbreak in the Americas and the unusual increase in microcephaly cases in Brazil. It highlighted existing resources available to PHE personnel, including the PHE Zika virus page:

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/zika-virus

and the National Travel Health Network and Centre website:

http://travelhealthpro.org.uk/

An additional training session will also be provided to the duty doctors in PHE.

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