Wes Streeting guarantees extra scans to cease osteoporosis | Politics | News | EUROtoday

Labour has pledged to ramp up the battle towards osteoporosis by delivering an additional 15,000 scans to catch the illness on the earliest attainable stage.

The Sunday Express scored a serious victory final month when each the Conservatives and Labour set the ambition of offering everybody in England with entry to specialist fracture providers that can spot bone illness and forestall life-threatening accidents.

Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting has now pledged to make sure that 1000’s extra sufferers get entry to cutting-edge “Dexa” scanners which assess the energy of bones.

More than 37,000 sufferers are ready for a Dexa scan and it’s feared that two-thirds of individuals with osteoporosis are lacking out on therapy.

Mr Streeting mentioned: “Osteoporosis is a debilitating illness that leads millions of people to suffer painful bone breaks and disability. The faster patients are diagnosed, the sooner they can be treated and helped to get on with living their lives to the full.

“Labour will ensure patients are seen quicker for bone scans, providing an extra 15,000 a year to beat the Tory backlog. Thanks to the Sunday Express’ roaring Better Bones campaign, osteoporosis is no longer the silent disease, and with a Labour government patients will be diagnosed earlier and treated faster.”

The promise is a part of Labour’s marketing campaign pledge to ship 40,000 further appointments every week – the equal of two million a yr – in a bid to deal with ready lists.

It intends to double the variety of NHS CT scanners, which may also be used to detect osteoporosis, over the subsequent half-decade.

Craig Jones of the Royal Osteoporosis Society mentioned Mr Streeting’s dedication to ship 15,000 extra Dexa scans a yr was “extremely welcome”. But he identified that some areas of the nation lack entry to those scanners.

Warning that aged sufferers can face a “three-hour round trip” to get a scan, he urged the Labour rising star to deal with these “cold spots”.

He mentioned Labour’s pledge will “give thousands of patients access to medication they desperately need to prevent dangerous fractures,” including: “The current backlog can be cleared in a couple of years. Crucially, though, last month’s commitment for fracture liaison services in every area by 2030 will mean tens of thousands of new patients being identified for scans, meaning a bigger boost to capacity is needed.

“These people are currently invisible to the system, but if this scans pledge is extended to cover them too then we can eradicate the lion’s share of fractures.”