Written evidence submitted by the Office for Life Sciences (INS0059)

Office for Life Sciences structure

The Office for Life Sciences (OLS) is a joint unit sitting in DHSC & BEIS. This unique position reflects OLS’s role working with industry and the NHS and shapes our core mission to improve the health and wealth of the nation by supporting a strong, resilient and innovative life sciences sector in the UK. OLS has supported the objectives of the Industrial Strategy via two programmes of sector deals that were implemented following the 2017 Life Sciences Industry Strategy.

OLS is led by Director Kristen McLeod and is currently split across 4 teams:

• The Innovation and Growth team is responsible for the delivery of critical healthcare and life sciences projects to improve the health and wealth of the nation including work on the cutting-edge use of DNA data to target cancer treatment and access to scale-up finance for innovative SMEs. 
• The Strategy, Investment and Manufacturing team leads on cross-cutting policy areas, strategy and drives the Life Sciences agenda across Whitehall. The team also manages the Life Sciences Council and its sub-boards to ensure effective strategic oversight of OLS’s work, leads on engagement with the sector’s most significant companies to drive investment into the UK; and creates policy to increase UK medicines and diagnostics manufacturing capacity. 
• The Trade, Regulation & Analysis team covers EU Future Relationship, rest of World trade, and represent the life sciences sector’s interests in the regulation of medicines and devices. The team is responsible for ensuring that the international trading opportunities of EU Exit are understood and maximised for the sector and that disruption is kept to a minimum.
• The Analytical team are an embedded group of multi-disciplinary analysts who support work across all teams in OLS. Through expertise in data visualisation, metrics development, impact assessments, and business case evaluation, the team builds the evidence base for policy development.

The team works largely on a project basis, with a wide range of delivery partners. OLS projects and team structures continually evolve over time to create capacity to keep pace with new opportunities in life sciences and reflect new priorities.

Routes of accountability to Ministers             

As a joint unit, OLS reports to both the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care.

Specific responsibilities for Life Science strategy and deliverables are divided between the two Parliamentary Under Secretaries, Lord Bethell (Minister for Innovation in DHSC) and Nadhim Zahawi, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Minister for Business and Industry) and Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (Minister for COVID Vaccine Deployment).

OLS also manages a programme of regular engagement with the Secretary of States and Ministers for BEIS and DHSC with industry via the Life Science Council meetings. Progress towards the objectives of the Life Sciences Industrial Strategy is reported at these meetings.

The Life Sciences Council (LSC) is the principal meeting between Government and industry to provide strategic oversight of the future of UK Life Sciences. The LSC takes place twice a year and is co-chaired by the Health Secretary, the Business Secretary, and the CEO of AstraZeneca. This principle of joint government and industry forums to guide our priorities and hold us to account for delivery is an important feature of how OLS operates.

The Council’s remit includes: 

• Setting strategic direction and oversight of the life sciences sector where Government, NHS, academia and industry (including pharma, MedTech, biotech and digital) can work together to boost the sector.
• Identifying and agreeing required priority actions and actioning sub-groups to deliver pieces of work as needed, to report back to the Council; and
• Working with the Life Sciences Industry Champion, Sir John Bell, to identify priority areas and future opportunities. 

The delivery of the priorities set out at the LSC is overseen by the Life Sciences Industrial Strategy Implementation Board (LSISIB), co-chaired by Minister Zahawi and Sir John Bell, Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford University. A report on the progress of the life science sector deals is a standing item on the LSISIB agenda.

Lord Bethell (DHSC Minister for Innovation) is co-chair of the following subgroups of the Life Sciences Council:

• The Health Technology Partnership (HTP)
• The EU Relationship Group (EURG)
• Patient Access to Medicines Partnership (PAMP)
• The National Geonomics Board (NGB)

Nadhim Zahawi (BEIS Minister for Business and Industry) co-chairs:

• The Life Sciences Industrial Strategy Implementation Board (LSISIB)
• The Innovation, Research and Data Expert Group (IRDG)

Contribution to supporting the Industrial Strategy’s sector deals

The 2017 Life Sciences Strategy, developed in partnership with industry, set out a shared roadmap for how the UK could take the lead on cutting edge, emerging industries which play to our competitive advantage such as genomics, early-stage diagnostics, advanced therapies, and digital health. This formed the basis of two successful Sector Deals in 2017/18 which were also developed in partnership with industry.

Key achievements in delivering the strategy include:

• The genome sequencing of 500,000 UK Biobank participants to create a globally unique research resource for early diagnosis of serious diseases, with sequencing in the NHS expected to start in Autumn 2020.
• Establishment of Our Future Health, the UK’s largest ever health research programme, to carry out polygenic risk scores on up to five million participants, potentially used to identify those at risk of chronic disease.
• The announcement and Phase 1 of 5 centres of excellence for the Digital Pathology and Radiology Programme, developing technology solutions and products for more intelligent analysis of medical imaging and pathology data.
• The creation of Digital Innovation Hubs, giving greater access to researchers and innovators to data from the NHS, social care and research laboratories.
• Securing significant investment, including a commitment from MSD to build a new £1bn UK Discovery Hub, and from UCB to a new state-of-the-art £1bn global R&D hub, set to begin construction in 2021 and supporting 650 jobs.
• Continued investment in the science base, committing to boost UK spending on R&D to 2.4% GDP by 2027.
• Establishment of the Accelerated Access Collaborative to deliver a step change in ambition and a commitment to increase NHS uptake of the best value new treatments and technologies, with a new long-term plan and funding package for the NHS now in place.

Wider contributions: OLS role in meeting the objectives of Grand Challenges

Artificial Intelligence and data

• We are driving our ambition to make the UK the home of data-driven life sciences research, innovation and development, and to create high value jobs across the UK. From precision medicine and genomics to the use of AI and robotic surgery, data, and its fair, ethical and transparent use, has huge potential and is key to life sciences research.

Achievements and output to date:

• The second Life Sciences Sector Deal set out five draft guiding principles and plans to establish a National Centre of Expertise to provide specialist advice and guidance, to support the NHS when entering into data-sharing partnerships with researchers and innovators.
• The five principles were tested and refined following an extensive period of engagement with the NHS, industry, medical research charities, public and patient engagement advocates, healthcare professionals, researchers and regulators, and a revised version published in July 2019. 
• The National Centre of Expertise, named the Centre for Improving Data Collaboration, was established within NHSX in June 2020 and is now developing a Value-Sharing Framework along with practical guidance and tools to support the implementation of the principles.
• The government has also invested £37.5m in the Digital Innovation Hubs Programme, to help stimulate a new wave of digital and data-driven innovations.  In October 2019 and following a competitive bidding process, seven ‘Health Data Research Hubs’ were launched. The hubs bring together partnerships between the NHS, industry, academia and charities.

Ageing Society

• Whilst OLS is not specifically involved in any biomedical research into the science of ageing, OLS contributes to the aims of the Ageing Society Grand Challenge by supporting people to live healthier lives for longer.
• Through the initiatives set out in the Life Sciences Industrial Strategy, OLS is supporting early disease detection and genomics, digital technologies and data analytics, and the development and manufacture of advanced therapy medicinal products (ATMPs), which are revolutionising healthcare and contributing to the Government’s aim of five more years of healthy and independent life by 2035.

Achievements and output to date:

• OLS is also the policy lead for the Whole Genome Sequencing Programme, which is being delivered by UKRI and the sponsor of Genomics England.
• In diagnostics, the UK has already led the way globally with initiatives like the 100,000 Genomes Project – the largest national sequencing project anywhere in the world. Building on the success of the Project, the Genomic Medicine Service in the NHS will be the first of its kind in the world to integrate whole genome sequencing into the healthcare system. It aims to deliver equitable access to genomic testing to help more accurately diagnose disease and personalise treatments and interventions.
• The Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund (ISCF) Medicines Manufacturing Challenge (MMC) has also delivered outputs that are expected to give the UK unique capabilities in the development of advanced medicines manufacturing technologies. Particular contributions include the Advanced Therapies Apprenticeship Programme which has trained 137 Apprentices and 10 apprenticeship schemes and the funding for 3 manufacturing innovation centres including the £12m Expansion of the cell and gene therapy catapult manufacturing centre, which was completed in 2019.
• The MMC has also enabled a variety of collaborations between large pharmaceutical firms, Contract development and manufacturing organizations (CDMOs), therapy developers, and the NHS. A key example is the Inclisiran deal between Novartis and the NHS, which includes an access agreement for high-risk patients to this cutting-edge cholesterol treatment, a large-scale NHS clinical trial, and the creation of a consortium with academic groups to try to improve the manufacturing of oligonucleotide drugs in the UK.

Clean Growth

• The implementation of the Life Sciences Industrial Strategy aims to support Net Zero by encouraging industry to adopt innovative technologies and support sustainable manufacturing growth.

Achievements and output to date:

• Working with the COP team in BEIS, OLS have engaged with life science companies to join the Race to Zero campaign via a range of initiatives but with a common path to set net zero targets (by 2050 at the latest) and commit to credible short term, independently verified action plans. Leading the life sciences push, GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca, Novartis and most recently Sanofi have joined the campaign.
• OLS also has provisions for sustainability in funding. For example, the £20m Medicines and Diagnostics Manufacturing Transformation Fund has been announced to grow and strengthen the UK’s capabilities, by encouraging companies to develop new technologies, build new factories and harness new advances, including bioprocessing, data and using greener manufacturing processes.

April 2021