Request
I am writing to you under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to request information regarding the numbers and outcomes of applications to the England Infected Blood Support Scheme (EIBSS) since its formation.
Specifically, I request the following information:
- Applications to EIBSS:
a) The total number of applications received by the EIBSS since its formation.
b) A yearly breakdown of the number of applications from the scheme's inception to the present date.
- Outcomes of Applications:
a) The number of successful applications (approved for support) since the scheme's formation.
b) The number of unsuccessful applications (rejected) since the scheme's formation.
c) A yearly breakdown of successful and unsuccessful applications.
- Reasons for Rejection:
a) Where possible, the number of applications that were rejected due to a lack of access to medical records or insufficient medical documentation.
b) Any available documentation or reports that outline the common reasons for the rejection of applications, specifically focusing on issues related to medical records.
Please provide the requested information in electronic format, if possible. If any of the information is not available or cannot be provided, please indicate the reasons why.
If fulfilling the entire request exceeds the statutory cost limits, please prioritise providing the breakdown of the number of applications, outcomes, and specifically the rejections linked to lack of medical records access.
On 27 June you clarified:
To address your queries:
- Applications to EIBSS:
I confirm that I am requesting information on both medical applications and discretionary support applications.
- Reasons for Rejection:
Given the limitations you mentioned regarding the manual checking exercise and the statutory cost limit, I would appreciate if you could prioritise the data as follows:
Firstly, by the date received.
If possible, please include any summarised data or reports that outline the common reasons for rejection, particularly focusing on issues related to medical records, even if this is in a generalised format
Response
I can confirm that the NHSBSA holds the information you have requested, and a copy of the information is attached.
All data as of 15 July 2024. All data relate to applications received to EIBSS since the formation of the scheme in November 2017.
Questions 1a and 1b
A copy of the information is attached
Questions 2a-2c
A copy of the information is attached
Please note that not all applications have an approved/declined outcome per reporting year and may carry over to following year.
Some applications have also been cancelled/withdrawn or had further information requested.
Question 3a and 3b
The NHSBSA does hold the requested information; however, the information is not held digitally and would have required a manual checking exercise of each application outcome. Therefore, as previously advised, the estimated cost of compliance with the request would have exceeded the appropriate limit under section 12 of the FOIA.
We estimated that the cost of complying with your request would exceed the non-central Government limit of £450. The limit is specified in The Freedom of Information and Data Protection (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004 and represents the estimated cost of one person spending 18 hours in determining whether the NHSBSA holds the information, and locating, retrieving, extracting and checking the information.
We estimate that it would take an average of 20 minutes to check each application, therefore for 13,386 applications this would equate to 4,462 hours.
In accordance with the duty to advise and assist under section 16 of the FOIA 2000, we wrote to advise you of the above and you clarified that you would like us to prioritise by the date received and to include any summarised data or reports that outline common reasons for rejection.
In line with your clarification, we are able to provide some information which is attached.
Please note that the summary of categories provided is based on a sample of 95 records due to the limitation of the checking exercise.
Publishing this response
Please note that this information will be published on our Freedom of Information disclosure log at:
https://opendata.nhsbsa.net/dataset/foi-01999
