{"id":6924,"date":"2015-11-24T14:39:24","date_gmt":"2015-11-24T14:39:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=6924"},"modified":"2015-11-24T14:39:24","modified_gmt":"2015-11-24T14:39:24","slug":"public-health-at-risk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=6924","title":{"rendered":"Public health at risk"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

Bowing to pressure from NHS chief executive Simon Stevens, health experts, unions and the public, chancellor George Osborne finally caved \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the Treasury announced today (November 24) that \u00c2\u01413.8bn in extra funding will be invested in the NHS next year.<\/p>\n

 
\nBut, as always with the chancellor \u00e2\u20ac\u201c who earlier this year tried justifying tax credit cuts by unveiling a bogus \u00e2\u20ac\u0098National Living Wage\u00e2\u20ac\u2122<\/a> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c there\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a catch.<\/p>\n

 
\nOn the eve of Osborne\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s spending review and autumn statement tomorrow (November 25), reports have emerged that the axe will fall hard on public health.<\/p>\n

 
\nAlready this year, public health, which has for the last two years been run by cash-strapped councils instead of the NHS, has been slashed by \u00c2\u0141200m.<\/p>\n

 
\nAnd because certain parts of public health budgets cannot be touched \u00e2\u20ac\u201c for example, national child measurement \u00e2\u20ac\u201c preventative programmes aimed at helping people lose weight, stop smoking, or tackle drug and alcohol abuse will be disproportionately hard hit.<\/p>\n

 
\nSince so many of the deadliest \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and costliest \u00e2\u20ac\u201c diseases can be prevented through better lifestyle choices, public health programmes are at the forefront of saving the taxpayer money.<\/p>\n

 
\nIn fact, the Faculty of Public Health has estimated that this year\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00c2\u0141200m public health axe will end up costing the NHS an extra \u00c2\u01411bn.<\/p>\n

 
\nFatal<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Public health also covers food testing, which helps detect often instantly fatal but invisible diseases.
\nTwo of the UK\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s five remaining Food, Water and Environment laboratories are set to close in a bid to save \u00c2\u01411m in response to public health budget cuts.<\/p>\n

 
\nTechnicians at these labs test food from restaurants, dairy products and other samples searching for deadly contaminants including salmonella, legionella and harmful strains of E.coli.<\/p>\n

 
\nUnite regional officer Dorothy Fogg warned that if the two laboratories close, this would entail the potential loss of 40 skilled jobs and would pose a serious health to public safety.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bUnite does not accept the closure of the Public Health England (PHE) labs in Birmingham and Preston; and that York is the only such lab in the Midlands and north of England,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bAny delay because of these two closures in analysing results could pose a problem, in certain circumstances, to the public health of the local population.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThree years ago there were about 19 labs all around the country,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Fogg added. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThese have been reduced to five and with the proposed closure of another two it will mean lots of travel, if not the people collecting the samples then the samples themselves.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThis is a major blow for food water and environmental hygiene and to our members across the country who have been in a destabilised state due to constant reorganisation within PHE.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nUnite national officer for local government Fiona Farmer argued that further cuts to public health must be \u00e2\u20ac\u015bstrongly resisted\u00e2\u20ac\u0165.<\/p>\n

 
\nBackbone<\/strong><\/em>
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bHealth secretary Jeremy Hunt and communities secretary Greg Clark need to develop some backbone to stand up to George Osborne on this vital issue,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe chancellor is fixated by the austerity ideology, regardless of the serious consequences to public health.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bAny cuts to the overall health budget by stealth smack of the dodgy economics of Arthur Daley,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Farmer added. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bPublic health cuts are a false economy and cuts to health prevention impact heavily on NHS services.<\/p>\n

 
\nFarmer explained that deep cuts to local government funding over the last five years have been \u00e2\u20ac\u015bdraconian\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 and added that \u00e2\u20ac\u015bpublic health will collapse with a further axing to funding\u00e2\u20ac\u0165.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bLocal councils face a financial meltdown and further cuts could see funds being diverted from public health to deliver basic waste, refuse and social care services,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said.<\/p>\n

 
\nIndeed, a British Medical Journal investigation<\/a> conducted after responsibility for public health was transferred from the NHS to local authorities, found that councils facing immense funding pressures were forced to divert public health money to support other threatened council services.<\/p>\n

 
\nAs local authority cuts bite harder \u00e2\u20ac\u201c government policies over the last five years have left councils with a funding black hole of nearly \u00c2\u014110bn<\/a> \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the inevitable collapse of public health could wipe out any gains made by Osborne\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s \u00c2\u01413.8bn commitment to the NHS next year.<\/p>\n

 
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bIt does seem incredibly short sighted to cut primary care which can prevent ill health,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 said Farmer. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThis will mean people end up swamping already struggling secondary care yet further.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nIn response to today\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s announcement about the government\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s extra NHS funding, chancellor George Osborne said that \u00e2\u20ac\u015bwe promised the British people that their priority was our priority, and we would fund our National Health Service.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165<\/p>\n

 
\nBut if the funding comes at the expense of cuts that in effect rob Peter to pay Paul, Osborne\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s latest budget bait and switch will leave no fooled.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bowing to pressure from NHS chief executive Simon Stevens, health experts, unions and the public, chancellor George Osborne finally caved \u00e2\u20ac\u201c the Treasury announced today (November 24) that \u00c2\u01413.8bn in extra funding will be invested in the NHS next year.   But, as always with the chancellor \u00e2\u20ac\u201c who earlier this year tried justifying tax […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6925,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[447,75,446],"wps_subtitle":"Health cuts threaten food bug testers ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6924"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6924"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6924\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6926,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6924\/revisions\/6926"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6925"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6924"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6924"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6924"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}