Agenda item - Public Health

Giles Rossington – Acting Head of Scrutiny & Peter Wilkinson - Consultant in Public Health Medicine & Deputy Director of Public Health

26.1 Dr Wilkinson gave an update on Public Health and the Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy (presentation attached).

26.2 Answering questions he said the resources allocated to the Council for the recently transferred Public Health responsibilities were reasonable.

26.3 Dr Wilkinson explained the process for producing the Joint Strategic Needs Assessment and the Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy. He outlined the reasons for the selection of the five priority public health issues for the Strategy.  He said the JSNA is kept updated and a full refresh would be considered in due course.

26.4 Dr Wilkinson was asked about age limits for the national programme of free health checks (stated to be from age 40 to age 74) and agreed to provide more information on reasons for the age limits.

26.5 The content, phrasing and tone of standard letters to service users was queried, and whether letters could be more clear and concise and more appropriately worded.

26.6 The Acting Head of Scrutiny Giles Rossington said that the new independent tenant scrutiny panel had agreed to review the Council’s communications with council tenants and leaseholders, relating to the housing service.

26.7 It was pointed out that families often do not know the connections between health services and local authority services; do not know where to go for help and advice on available options.

26.8 The Chair thanked the speakers for their useful information.