Ruth Jones

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship again, Sir Alec. I welcome the Minister to her place; it is great to see her. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for North Ayrshire and Arran (Irene Campbell) for introducing this e-petition debate on behalf of the Petitions Committee, and the 240 of my constituents who signed it. I also thank the Story family for submitting the e-petition and for all the work that they do to raise awareness of the importance of early diagnosis and type 1 diabetes in memory of Lyla. Prior to this debate, I was honoured to speak with Welsh campaigners Beth Baldwin and Emma Hopkins from Rewrite Peter’s Story—and Beth is here today in the Public Gallery. Beth’s son Peter suddenly and unexpectedly died aged 13 in 2015 from diabetic ketoacidosis as a result of undiagnosed type 1 diabetes. Beth had taken Peter to the GP with flu-like symptoms. After being diagnosed with a chest infection, Peter was prescribed antibiotics and sent home. Less than 24 hours later, Peter was fighting for his life. The first responder who was called to the house by Beth, on seeing Peter, gave him oxygen and performed a finger-prick test. His blood sugar was extremely high, and he was rushed to A&E. Unfortunately, he was already in diabetic ketoacidosis, and died a few days later. Peter’s death was preventable. Instant blood glucose finger-prick tests are easily available and take seconds, but each year hundreds of children are hospitalised with diabetic ketoacidosis because of delays in diagnosis. Each year, 10 of those children end up dying. Concerningly, 40% of all child diagnoses occurred only once they reached critical care. I am very pleased to hear about the campaigning of Lyla’s family and Peter’s family, and once again I want to thank them all for their work in drawing attention to these important issues. We must move swiftly to extend awareness and training on type 1 diabetes, and to ensure medical guidance is robust and that all primary care sites have the necessary testing equipment. We cannot afford to lose any more lives.