To ask the Secretary of State for Health (1) if she will make a statement on how the dental health care of children is being improved; and what further plans she will bring forward;(2) what monitoring of adult and child dental health care her Department is now doing; and if she will make a statement.
The provision of dental treatment and the monitoring of the dental health of all age groups of the population is a matter for district health authorities to undertake jointly with family health services authorities. Health authorities also arrange for the screening of teeth of children in state-funded schools at least three times in each child's school life.
The Department conducts decennial surveys of the dental health of adults and children alternately each five years. The last survey of adults was carried out in 1988. A survey of children is now in progress. The 1983 child dental health survey, copies of which are available in the Library, showed that among eight-year-olds, the proportion with some active decay in their permanent dentition had decreased from 40 per cent. in 1973 to 17 per cent. in 1983 and among 14-year-olds from 61 per cent. to 37 per cent.
To ask the Secretary of State for Health when she expects to bring forward new proposals for dental remuneration; and if she will make a statement.
We shall announce our proposals in due course.