Written question asked by Audrey Wise (Labour) on Wednesday, 23 June 1999, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Thursday, 1 July 1999. It was answered by John Denham (Labour) on Thursday, 1 July 1999 on behalf of the Department of Health.

Dept of Health

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Health, what steps he is taking to increase the availability of dental treatment on the NHS. - Inc figures.

Answer: Audrey Wise: To ask the Secretary of State for Health what steps he is taking to increase the availability of dental treatment on the NHS. [88604] Mr. Denham: The Government have already taken action to improve the availability of National Health Service (NHS) dentistry through the Investing in Dentistry (IID) and Personal Dental Services (PDS) initiatives. The IID initiative, which ended in April, should give over 650,000 extra patients the opportunity of registering with an NHS dentist. The 15 PDS pilots which began in October 1998, and the 24 new proposals to be developed into pilots for this October, are designed to offer NHS patients a better, more accessible, reliable and higher quality dental service. The Government are now examining options on how best to use the resources available for further improving the availability of dentistry. A dental strategy will be published later this year.

Secondary information