Member

The cleanest way of doing this would be to say that such professionals may respond to the patient only when the patient themselves raises this issue. If a patient goes to their medical professional and asks them a question, it is reasonable to expect that expert to answer it in some way, either by responding to the content of the question or by directing the patient to somewhere they can get that information. It would be not helpful if that expert were to refuse to engage, because that would simply drive the person away to some other forum—often a dangerous online forum, as my noble friend Lady Berridge said. It is not appropriate for these professionals to raise this issue proactively.