Health secretary scraps funding for survey of British attitudes to NHS

The Department of Health for England has scrapped its funding for the British social attitudes survey—the long running annual snapshot of people’s attitudes to a huge range of social issues, including the public’s willingness to fund and its levels of satisfaction with the NHS.

At the same time Andrew Lansley, the health secretary, has to decide whether to let the NHS Information Centre go ahead with its plans to cease, with immediate effect, its £300 000 (€340 000; $480 000) a year contribution to the Great Britain general lifestyle survey, a key source of information on smoking and drinking, health conditions, and the public’s use of health services.

The Information Centre’s …