Issue - items at meetings - Public Health: Annual Report of the Director of public Health

Dr Tom Scanlon, Brighton & Hove Director of Public Health, will present his 2009 Annual Report (verbal)

24.1    This item was introduced by Dr Tom Scanlon, Director of Public Health for Brighton & Hove. Dr Scanlon presented his 2009 Annual report to members, focusing particularly on the issues of suicide, sexually transmitted diseases and teenage pregnancy, and alcohol.

24.2    In response from a question from Cllr Marsh on the whether suicide rates were affected by the inward migration of substance misusers etc, Dr Scanlon told the committee that inward migration might partly account for high local figures, but was unlikely to be a major factor. Suicides of people resident in the city for less than 6 months are not recorded as resident suicides, so the rate is not being inflated by very recent migrants.

24.3    In answer to a question regarding the expense of producing his annual report, Dr Scanlon told members that the cost of the 2009 report was a little less than £12,000. Much of this was effectively paid to the council, as the report was compiled using in-house services. Dr Scanlon wrote much of the report in his own time, and this had not been charged to the council.

24.4    In response to a question from Cllr Wakefield-Jarrett as to why performance on addressing health inequalities was not better, Dr Scanlon replied that although some aspects of performance were not good (e.g. cancer rates), others were much more positive (e.g. coronary heart disease). Ultimately, tackling health inequalities is not primarily a matter of improving health services alone, but of making necessary advances in areas such as housing, employment, planning and education. The recent announcement that public health responsibilities would be returned to local authorities was welcome in this context as it should make co-ordination across these services more straightforward.

24.5    In answer to a question from Cllr Harmer-Strange as to which aspects of public health offered the best opportunities for improvement, Dr Scanlon told members that alcohol and sexual health probably offered the best scope for making significant gains. However, it may be that progress will only be achieved at the expense of being more ‘prescriptive’ in terms of encouraging people to adopt healthy lifestyles.

24.6    In response to a question from Cllr Allen on plans for the 2010 Annual Report, Dr Scanlon told the committee that he intended to focus on community resilience – how communities could become more involved in improving their own health outcomes.

24.7    In answer to a query from Cllr Lizzie Deane concerning socio-economic factors in developing dementia, Dr Scanlon told members that more work needed to be done on this topic via the local Joint Strategic Needs Assessment process.

24.8    The Chairman thanked Dr Scanlon for his contribution and commended his 2009 Annual Report.