Parents Of Meningitis Victim To Address MPs

Jenny and Neil Burdett's daughter, Faye, lost her life after an 11-day battle - and a distressing image of the two-year-old when she was seriously ill prompted hundreds of thousands of people to sign a petition calling for all youngsters to be protected.

They will be joined by the former England rugby captain Matt Dawson, whose son survived meningitis C, as he believes the lack of a universal scheme is causing "needless heartache".

Lee Booth, who instigated the campaign after learning one of his young daughters was too old to receive the vaccine on the NHS, will also attend the hearing.

His petition was the most signed in parliamentary history, and closed on Tuesday after attracting 823,341 signatures. A date for debate by MPs is yet to be set.

Earlier in March, the Department of Health responded to the petition - and said it would not be cost-effective for the NHS to offer meningitis B vaccines to all children under 11.

The current system immunises babies when they are two months old, and the Government said it "would not represent a good use of NHS resources" to expand it to older age groups.

But on Monday, Mr Booth said a price should not be put on a child's life - and argued the NHS would get better value for money vaccinating all children compared to the cost of treating meningitis survivors for the rest of their lives.

In February, the Burdetts said they were "campaigning for change in Faye's memory" - as they are suffering "a pain you cannot describe".

Parents who want to vaccinate children not covered by the Government's immunisation scheme currently need to pay for a private procedure.

However, some private clinics have had to turn away families because there has been a global shortage of the Bexsero vaccine.

The pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline has said UK supplies may not increase until the summer - but the NHS programme for babies is unaffected.

Source: http://news.sky.com/ By Sky News  Photo: Sky News