Heart Disease and Stroke: Premature Deaths
House of Commons · Westminster Hall · 2 Jul 2026 · 35 speeches · Official Report
Gentlemen may take off their jackets off if they wish.
I beg to move, That this House has considered the matter of reducing levels of premature deaths from heart disease and stroke. It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Siobhain. I thank hon. Members for attending the debate. Cardiovascular disease remains one of the United Kingdom’s biggest killers and one of the greatest public health challenges facing our country. It devastates families, communities and livelihoods in every corner of the UK. It has touched countless families, including my own. My challenge is not cardiovascular disease but a congenital heart defect- a silent killer that was diagnosed last year following a routine health check. I am still completely symptom-free, but will have to have open heart surgery to replace my aortic valve at some point. I am, however, in the very safe hands of the NHS. Today is about ensuring that the voices of those living with cardiovascular conditions are heard in the House, but it is also about something even more fundamental. For the first time in more than half a century, we have seen progress on cardiovascular disease moving in the wrong direction. The question before us today is simple: are we willing to accept that, or are we prepared to tackle it? With the right political will and the right action, we can once again make the UK a country in which fewer people die young from heart disease and stroke. The debate also comes at a significant moment for the British Heart Foundation. That charity, which was founded...
My hon. Friend is making an important and passionate speech, especially in the light of the personal circumstances that he mentioned. I agree with him about deprivation. Does he agree that access to fresh, affordable food is incredibly important, particularly in the most deprived areas? In Castlemilk in my constituency, it is much easier to get a bottle of vodka than it is to get a banana. Does he agree that fixing that is part of the solution?
I absolutely agree. If we could get fresh food to more of our communities and young people, it would have a massive positive effect on dealing with CVD-that must be dealt with. This debate could not be more timely. The Government have rightly identified CVD as one of the UK’s biggest killers, and have set a welcome ambition to reduce premature deaths from heart disease and stroke by 25% over the next decade. Parliament has a responsibility not just to welcome those commitments, but to scrutinise how they will be delivered. The forthcoming CVD modern service framework for England, which Ministers have said will be published soon, presents a rare opportunity to reset our approach to heart health, but the real question is whether it will be equal to the scale of the challenge before us. This debate is also an important opportunity to press the Government on what the framework will contain, how it will be implemented and whether it will deliver significant improvements in prevention, diagnosis, treatment and care. Although the framework will focus on England, the challenge of CVD knows no borders. This is a UK-wide challenge, and the lessons, opportunities and ambitions that we discuss today must resonate across all four of our nations. Let me move on to the role of research and innovation. If CVD is one of our greatest challenges, research is one of our greatest opportunities. The remarkable progress made over the past six decades did not happen by accident; it happened thanks...
I remind Members to bob if they wish to be called in the debate.
I call Mark Francois.
It is a pleasure to speak in this important debate about preventing premature death from heart disease and stroke. I congratulate the hon. Member for South Ribble (Mr Foster) on securing the debate and introducing it so ably. It is courageous of him to talk about the medical challenges that he has faced, and I am sure that the whole House wishes him the very best of luck on his journey. It is also nice to be with him in Westminster Hall, having spent five months debating with him in the Armed Forces Bill Committee. Stockholm syndrome kicked in, and we even started to like each other by the end, so it is doubly pleasurable to follow him in this debate. It is great to see the shadow Health Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Daventry (Stuart Andrew)-a man I have always respected-in his place, and to see the Minister, whom I also respect. I have bumped into her in the Portcullis House lifts many times down the years, and it is wonderful to see her in a ministerial position. I wish to declare two interests. First, I am a long-time supporter of the British Heart Foundation, which does great work to research heart disease and improve the technology and techniques to combat what is still, I am sad to say, one of Britain’s greatest killers. I pay tribute to that wonderful charity. I also wish to pay tribute to my wife Olivia, who has worked in the NHS for some two decades now, and who revels in the title of lead neurointerventional radiographer. That is a bit of a...
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dame Siobhain. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Mr Foster) for securing this important debate and for his opening remarks on his own health. We all wish him well. My speech today will focus on heart health. I am a former chair of the all-party parliamentary group on cardiac risk in the young, where unknown heart conditions among young people are discussed. Keeping hearts healthy carries a broad message around prevention, lifestyle and early intervention, but what tools are we giving people? Diet is a key example, and it starts with our young people. We cannot talk about reducing premature deaths from heart disease and stroke without talking about the environments in which people live. As an active member of the APPG on school food, where I was proud to serve alongside the Minister, I know how important it is for school food to meet nutritional standards and build healthy lifestyles and eating habits from an early age. Last year, 34% of year 6 children in my constituency were classed as obese. Meeting them where they are at with healthy habits when they are young is crucial. That is why I am so pleased to see free breakfast clubs rolling out across the country-I have two in my constituency-as well as plans to overhaul school food standards for the first time in over a decade. It is now about convincing parents that school food is healthy and nutritional for their children, particularly when under 2%...
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dame Siobhain. I thank the hon. Member for South Ribble (Mr Foster) for setting the scene incredibly well on a subject that affects all of us. As always, I will give some stats for Northern Ireland, where unfortunately we seem to have a particular problem when it comes to premature deaths from heart disease and stroke. I declare an interest as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on vascular and venous disease, which has looked at the subject in some detail. It is a pleasure to see the Minister in her place. I wish her well; she seems to be in Westminster Hall almost as much as I am, but with much more authority, I have to say. She and I have been friends for many years. I always start looking forward to her contributions the day before I hear them, because I know she will work incredibly hard to give us the answers we wish for; I thank her for that in advance. It is also nice to see the right hon. Member for Daventry (Stuart Andrew) in his place. He was a busy man when he was in Government and is now a busy man as a shadow Minister. He is always approachable, always dedicated and always dependable. We thank him for his commitment to the subject. We cannot shy away from what the British Heart Foundation has rightly called a “ticking timebomb” on heart health. Across the United Kingdom, cardiovascular disease claims a life every three minutes. This debate will last for about an hour and a half, so the mathematics are...
The hon. Gentleman is, as always, generous with his time. We all fully appreciate the slant that he brings from Northern Ireland. Would he agree that there is also the issue of regional inequalities within England? We see in Yorkshire and the north of England some of the worst rates of survival when it comes to cardiovascular disease. Does he agree that we need to do more to close the gap when it comes to people from more deprived backgrounds and the poorer health outcomes that they face as a result of heart disease, stroke and other CVD?
The hon. Gentleman always sums up the thrust of the debate in his interventions; he has outlined that there is sometimes a postcode lottery. He is also right to underline that in areas with deprivation where the emphasis on health is probably less, the issues and the number of those with heart disease rise as well. I must also declare an interest: I have lived with type 2 diabetes for over 20 years. To put that into perspective, I could call myself a big fat pudding-I was 17 stone at one time. I am now 13 and a quarter stone. I have done that through a bit of willpower, but also by trying to cut out the sweet stuff. I am not always successful, but I do try very hard. My diabetes is controlled by medication, and I thank God every day that we are able to control it that way. I know first hand how closely linked diabetes and high blood pressure are. I take a tablet for blood pressure; I cannot speak for anybody else here, but when hon. Members come to a certain age, they probably will as well. Along with high cholesterol, those two things increase the risk of a catastrophic stroke or heart attack. I was recently at the diabetes event in the Churchill Room. The lady in charge told me that people with diabetes must always get a check at least once a year-have their heart checked and ensure that their blood pressure is under control.
As chair of the all-party parliamentary group for diabetes, I should say that we have been pushing to make sure that, when people with diabetes have those diabetic care processes, those are better linked with other comorbidities and ancillary services. Does he agree that we need to see more of that to get better outcomes for people with those comorbidities?
I certainly do; the hon. Gentleman and I most definitely agree about that. The tragedy is that so much of this premature loss of life is entirely preventable; if it can be prevented, then we should be doing more. The British Heart Foundation reports that half of all strokes and heart attacks are linked directly to high blood pressure. In his intervention, the hon. Member for Harrogate and Knaresborough (Tom Gordon) has again underlined that, as I have likewise tried to. Right now in Northern Ireland, over 42,000 diagnosed hypertension patients are not being treated to clinical guidelines. That is unfortunate. Furthermore, 66,000 high-risk individuals are missing out on statins to control their cholesterol. There are things that can be done and prevention strategies that we should focus on. My hope would be that those will improve. If we optimise care, we can save hundreds of lives almost immediately. Surely if we can do that, we should be doing it. If we can treat blood pressure properly over the next three years, we can prevent 380 strokes and 260 heart attacks in Northern Ireland alone-the place I am bringing the stats from. The issue is not just about statistics, of course. It is about early detection, standardising care and addressing health inequalities. I look to the Minister to outline what direct, co-ordinated action the Government are taking with their devolved counterparts: the hon. Member for South Ribble referred to that in his speech-I thank him for referring to...
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dame Siobhain. I congratulate my near-neighbour and hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Mr Foster) on securing this important debate. I wish him well. I also congratulate the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) on achieving the childhood ambition of having his very own bat-phone. I am, as they say, well jel.
I am sorry to disappoint the hon. Gentleman, not least as he is being so kind to me, but for the record it is my wife’s bat-phone, not mine.
It will have been very important to place that on the record once the right hon. Gentleman gets home this evening, I imagine. The Government’s aim to reduce premature deaths from heart disease and stroke by 25% over the next decade is welcome, ambitious and absolutely necessary. Cardiovascular disease remains one of the biggest public health challenges that this country faces. Across the country more than 8 million people live with cardiovascular disease. As has been mentioned, despite decades of progress, we now see a worrying reversal. Premature deaths are rising again for the first time in over half a century. One thing I have personally been doing to reduce my chances of being a victim of cardiovascular disease is walking more. During the recent Makerfield by-election, I was very lucky-not just to be part of the wonderful campaign to return a new Member to this House but to undertake almost half-a-million steps around the streets of Wigan over the course of 17 punishing days. I am celebrating not only a new Member for Makerfield but having lost four pounds. For those of us who represent communities in the north-west, the challenges around cardiovascular disease are particularly acute. Health inequalities remain stark. People living in some of our most deprived communities are significantly more likely to develop cardiovascular disease and more than twice as likely to die prematurely from it. Behind every one of those statistics is a family changed forever. There is good...
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship this afternoon, Dame Siobhain. I congratulate the hon. Member for South Ribble (Mr Foster) on securing this important debate and thank him for sharing his story. Like so many families across the country, mine has its own history of heart disease, either with tragic, early death or, for my father, a triple heart bypass in 2012. He celebrated his 80th birthday this year. Reducing premature deaths from heart disease and stroke is one of the defining public health challenges facing our country. It is also one of the greatest opportunities. We know what works and where the risks lie; the question is whether this Government are prepared to invest in preventing illness rather than simply responding to it once people become sick. Cardiovascular disease remains the second biggest cause of death in England; every day, around 390 people die from a heart attack or stroke. Heart and circulatory diseases are responsible for one in four premature deaths, while more than 6.4 million people in England are living with cardiovascular disease. It is particularly concerning that progress has stalled. After years of improvement, premature mortality from cardiovascular disease has begun to rise again. The latest figures show that rates have returned to around where they were over a decade ago. Behind those statistics are families who have lost loved ones far too early; many of those deaths could have been prevented. Perhaps the greatest injustice is...
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dame Siobhain. I congratulate the hon. Member for South Ribble (Mr Foster) on securing this important debate and talking about his personal circumstances. It is always a very moving moment when colleagues talk about things that are so very personal to them. I also pay tribute to the wife of my right hon. Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) for the work that she and her team do. It was fascinating to listen to my right hon. Friend. There may have been a bit more detail than I would have wanted to hear, but it told us a lot about the importance of that treatment. I share an ambulance region with the hon. Member for North West Leicestershire (Amanda Hack), so I know exactly what she is talking about and how important it is. I thank her for her work with the APPG, and particularly for highlighting the issue for young people. It is important to remember that heart disease and stroke affect all age groups. I thank the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for his work on the APPG and for his kind words. I visited his constituency when I was a Minister. If only I could have as much love as he gets from his constituents-he is hugely respected. I feel like we will all have to club together to get a bat-phone for the hon. Member for Southport (Patrick Hurley). He made some incredible points, particularly about smoking. I confess that I gave up smoking in February. It was hard, but I know how important it is. I...
For many years, stroke units have had access to thrombolysis-or “the shot”, as it is known in the trade. However, that is a very rough way of doing it, and it can have side effects and impede a patient’s recovery. Mechanical thrombectomy is a far more accurate way of solving a stroke problem, and with far less risk of subsequent side effects. That is why we are so keen to see its use grow, and I second my right hon. Friend’s request to the Minister.
My right hon. Friend is so right. When he was describing its importance, I was thinking about one of my very dear friends who suffered quite a debilitating stroke. I thought, “If only that had been available for him, how different his life might be now.” I thank my right hon. Friend for raising that. Care should not end when a patient leaves the acute ward. Someone who has survived a stroke might need to relearn how to walk, speak, eat and carry out other basic daily tasks. Rehabilitation and continuing community support are essential if people are to regain their independence and reduce the risk of another stroke. The same is true after a heart attack. Cardiac rehabilitation, medication reviews and support to manage risk factors can prevent further illness and save lives, yet access to rehabilitation remains uneven and too many patients experience a cliff edge between hospital and community care. The Government have committed to reducing premature deaths from heart disease and stroke by 25% within a decade. That is a serious ambition, and, where they are taking practical actions to achieve it, they will absolutely have our full support, but it is important that that ambition is matched by a credible plan. In a letter dated 28 May, the Minister said that the framework we are expecting would be published in the spring. That deadline has now passed, so, like others, I again ask when that will be published. Will it contain clear milestones against which that 25% commitment can...
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Dame Siobhain. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Mr Foster) for securing this debate on such an important issue. I also commend him on sharing his own personal experience with his diagnosis of a congenital heart defect. I thought, as he was speaking, that it just goes to show that we should never judge solely based on how someone presents on the outside, because we never know what is going on inside; I know he served in the Royal Engineers, and he is also very fit and active. He rightly highlighted why this Government are determined to tackle cardiovascular disease head on through earlier prevention and diagnosis, because that is what is really going to make the difference. I also thank all hon. Members for their valuable contributions this afternoon. It is clear that far too many lives are still being cut short by cardiovascular disease. In recent years, heart disease and stroke caused around 33,000 premature deaths per year, and it is the second leading cause of death in England after cancer. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) gave a powerful speech, bringing this issue into stark focus with regard to Northern Ireland. I have to say, I share his pleasure in spending so much time in these important debates in Westminster Hall; he and I are usually the common denominator. I want to refer to some of the things that he said, specifically about the ticking time bomb that cardiovascular disease...
For the record, my request was that the public health grant be restored back to 2015 levels, not 2010 levels.
Right, the hon. Lady said 2015. I am being too clever for my own boots. I wrote down 2010, but of course, as I said in correcting myself, the big cut was in 2015. I am pleased that the hon. Lady has corrected the record for us all. As I say, we have set an ambitious goal to reduce premature mortality from heart disease and stroke in the under-75s by a quarter in the next 10 years. As part of the first wave of the new generation of modern service frameworks, we will publish a cardiovascular disease modern service framework soon. My hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble asked me about that, and I shall move on to answer his questions. He asked when; the answer is soon. The Department and NHS England have engaged widely to consider a range of conditions that are most likely to drive progress on the Government’s ambition and the CVD MSF-if Members do not mind me using the acronym to save words-will set out 12 high impact priority action areas, descriptions of how unwarranted variation should be addressed and a road map for the next 10 years. The framework will be backed by clear accountability and routine monitoring of progress using existing NHS performance and oversight arrangements. To support the delivery of the framework across the system, we will launch a series of ambitious strategic partnerships between Government, the NHS, industry and the voluntary sector. We thank the British Heart Foundation for its support and participation as a task and finish group member for...
There are indications that the weight loss injections and tablets available on the NHS are very effective, but there is some concern about the side effects of weight reduction programmes. Has the Department ever looked at addressing side effects for those who want to lose weight but face other problems because of it?
As with all medication, it is obviously up to GPs to consider side effects when prescribing. Some side effects might be apparent sooner rather than later, but they are definitely conversations that patients need to have closely and quickly with prescribers and GPs. I encourage all constituents to be cognisant of side effects and not just hope that they will go away or that they do not matter. They should always be raised with their GP. The modern service framework, which is coming soon, will identify and set standards for the best-evidenced interventions to support consistent, high-quality and equitable care across the cardiovascular disease pathway. It will set out an ambitious vision for the future, identifying areas where further progress is needed to build the evidence base or to accelerate innovations to deliver best outcomes for patients. We know that there are unacceptable inequalities across CVD prevention, diagnosis, treatment and care. That is why the CVD MSF will set out strategic priorities and a clear direction on what health and care systems should focus on to drive improvement and outcomes and to tackle unwarranted variation. A number of hon. Members have highlighted prevention issues and I will address their questions at this point. We know that around 70% of the CVD burden is preventable and due to risk factors that can be modified by behaviour changes, early identification and management, so the early detection of risk factors is key. My hon. Friend the...
I am sure that the potential new Prime Minister will have noted very carefully the commitment of the hon. Member for Southport (Patrick Hurley), who mentioned that he lost 4 lbs during the by-election; I have a pound coin, and I am happy to make it up to a round fiver to help him get his money back, if that helps.
Very good. I must apologise to my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Patrick Hurley) for getting his constituency name wrong. I cannot read my own writing-I do know that Southport and Stockport are very different places. Walking is important, but we must work hard to tackle the obesogenic environment, our propensity to eat ultra-processed food and the food deserts in our constituencies. Sadly, some of the most deprived areas are also the most health-unequal communities as well. That is not a coincidence; one leads to the other. That is an area of the Department’s work I am massively focused on. The right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) spoke about his wonderful wife of two decades, who is a lead neuroradiographer-
Lead neurointerventional radiographer.
Very good. She works at Queen’s hospital in east London, and I was very interested to hear about the “bring your husband to work” day, although I am glad she did not keep the right hon. Gentleman there. What he described sounded fascinating, although not for the faint-hearted, as he said. On behalf of the NHS and the Government, I thank Olivia and her team for the outstanding work they do every day and for their service and skill. It is such important work. He asked me about the role of mechanical thrombectomy, which he said has been used for less than a decade. The NHS is working to increase thrombectomy rates as a key intervention to improve patient outcomes, so hopefully Olivia is going to be as busy as ever. He is rightly proud of her, as I am sure she is of him.
Will the Minister give way?
We are having a love-in here.
Yes-don’t tell my wife! I thank the Minister very much for what she says about Olivia, her colleagues and all the others who work in the NHS in that field. I will chance my arm and say that they are based about an hour from London; if ever the Minister had time to pop along and see what they do in person, I think she would be both very welcome and incredibly impressed.
My private office will have made note of that. I would be happy to pay a visit to the hospital and am interested to look at that work. My hon. Friend the Member for North West Leicestershire asked about ambulance wait times. NHS England is working with East Midlands ambulance service to support improvements in response times, which will increase frontline ambulance availability, improve productivity and strengthen performance. I can assure her that that work is under way. In England, the NHS health check for individuals aged 40 to 74 is designed to assess the top risk factors for cardiovascular disease and refer people to further support where appropriate. The NHS health check is wide reaching it engages more than 1.4 million people a year and, through behavioural and clinical interventions, prevents around 500 heart attacks or strokes a year. We know that there is more to do to improve uptake of the health check. As part of our efforts to make the shift from analogue to digital, we are developing the NHS health check online and increasing the flexibility of the programme so that people can complete it at home at a time more convenient to them. Finding and supporting people with undetected high blood pressure early is, as a number of colleagues mentioned, critical to preventing heart attacks and strokes. I think we can all remember the former shadow Health Secretary, Jonathan Ashworth. He had undiagnosed high blood pressure and recently had a heart attack. We cannot just...
I call Paul Foster to wind up, very quickly.
I thank the Minister for giving me 50 seconds. This is one of those very rare topics where we have cross-party consensus from every party in the House: we all want the Government to be successful in what they seek to achieve, reducing deaths from stroke and cardiovascular disease by 25%. I thank the Minister for a very detailed response. I also thank the shadow Minister, the right hon. Member for Daventry (Stuart Andrew) for giving up his time and again giving a very detailed response. I thank the right hon. Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) and join in the tributes to his wife Olivia. I thank all other Members, and I thank Jared for sharing his story with us; he is now in Hansard . Finally, I thank the British Heart Foundation-please keep up the good work-and I thank you, too, Dame Siobhain, for giving up your time to chair this afternoon. Question put and agreed to. Resolved, That this House has considered the matter of reducing levels of premature deaths from heart disease and stroke.