Howard takes Blair to task over PDTdelays

This latest debate began last week (March 3) when leader of the opposition Michael Howard quizzed the Prime Minister in the House of Commons as to why the statutory three-month implementation period for guidance from the National Institute for Clinical Excellence was extended to nine months, meaning 2,800 people will go blind unnecessarily according to an RNIB estimate. He also disputed the health secretary Dr John Reid's explanation that the delay was due to a 'lack of trained personnel'.
Tony Blair said he was unable to answer because he 'did not know the details at the moment,' but a statement from Dr Reid said: 'We are already rolling this out as fast as we can. Where capacity exists, local commissioners can already provide PDT for NHS patients.'
But Steve Winyard, head of public policy at the RNIB, which backed the Tory leader's calls to end the delay, told optician: 'There's a great deal of dissembling going on in the Department of Health. We know a lot of PCTs are simply refusing to provide funding. They know they don't have to until the nine months are up. We have the situation, for example at Kings College, Oxford and Nottingham, where there are retinal specialists with the laser, with the support teams, all ready to treat, but it's simply a matter of the PCTs refusing to provide the funding.'
The RNIB has a list of 46 hospitals nationwide that can provide PDT for people who will otherwise go blind. In a letter to the Prime Minister last week, the RNIB's chief executive Lesley-Anne Alexander suggested he visited the Oxford Radcliffe Infirmary where world-class retinal specialists are having to turn away NHS patients because the Oxford PCT has refused to provide funding.
The dispute continued on Tuesday when Winyard clashed with health minister Rosie Winterton on the Radio 4 programme In Touch. Despite Winyard quoting South West Oxfordshire PCT that it was 'unable to fund' PDT, Winterton insisted that money was not a factor: 'If there is the capacity the treatment can go ahead now, it's already been taking place.'