ADPH responds to LGA report

Greg Fell, ADPH President has welcomed today’s report from the Local Government Association urging the Government to introduce a national health inequalities strategy to tackle England’s widening health inequality gap: 

“People in the least deprived areas of the country can expect to live 19 more years in good health, compared to those in the most deprived areas. This is clearly unacceptable.  

“Health inequalities are driven by many factors, including housing, education, income, employment, and the environment, and the gap between the most and least deprived areas is widening. As well as these social determinants of health, commercial influences also have an impact on our health with poor health caused by the consumption of alcohol, tobacco, unhealthy foods, and gambling, disproportionately affecting people in deprived areas, making existing inequalities worse.  

“Closing this gap needs an ambitious, health in all policies approach that takes into account that decisions made across all Government departments have an impact on our health. It is also vital that we listen and respond to the needs of local communities by giving people the opportunity to be involved in developing and shaping their environment. 

“The Government has pledged to halve the gap in healthy life expectancy between the richest and poorest regions in England. In order to make that a reality though we need to tackle these issues as a whole, and, as today’s report says, develop a dedicated national health inequalities strategy with clearly defined targets so that we can live in a society where good health is considered the norm and people have the freedom to live longer, healthier lives, no matter what their background or where they live.”