Unit 8: Promoting Public Health
Section 1. LAA
Public Health is ‘the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life, promoting health through
the organised efforts of society.’ For example, they “monitor the health status of the community”
“identify health needs”, “develop programmes to reduce risk”, “screen for early disease”, “control
communicable disease”, “foster policies that promote health” and “plan and evaluate the provision
of health care.” (Whitehouse, Mary et al, 2010) Public Health originated in the nineteenth century
(1834) with the Poor Law and Victorian sanitary reform movement, as shown in appendix 1
attached.
Local Authorities were given permission to hire a qualified health officer to improve sanitation in the
area. For example, building servers and provide a clean water supply. Edwin Chadwick was employed
to study living conditions in Britain. Then, in 1842, he wrote a report about sanitary conditions of the
labouring population and stated that poverty and ill-health has caused these living conditions.
Public Health Policy has set out seven key aims for practice:
1. Planning national provision of healthcare and promoting the health of the population . For
example, in cases of obesity, they are managing to help people to reduce their weight and
sustain that change. This means that, Public Health aims to assess the provision of relevant
health services and whether or not they are having sufficient impact on the problem.
(Whitehouse, Mary et al, 2010)
2. Identifying and monitoring the needs of the population . For example, in cases of obesity,
they assess the likely increase in the need for diabetes support services. This explains that,
when trends and patterns are established, the impacts for services can be identified.
(Whitehouse, Mary et al, 2010)
3. Identifying and reducing inequalities between groups and communities in society . For
example, they support local areas on risk factors such like smoking, with targeted
interventions on reducing levels of smoking in deprived areas, also focusing on reducing
smoking during pregnancy and in mental health settings. (GOV.UK, 2017)
4. Protecting individuals, groups and communities in society from threats to health and
wellbeing that arise from environmental hazards and communicable disease. For example, in
measles, mumps and rubella, they may include food hygiene measures in restaurants and
take-aways to prevent or control the spread of food poisoning or introduce vaccinations
(Whitehouse, Mary et al, 2010). In 1854, John Snow investigated on how cholera has spread
and found out that there was an involvement of contaminated water and development of
cholera. After that, he was able to stop the spread of the infection. (Aldworth et al, 2016)
5. Addressing specific national health problems over a period of time . For example, the
increasing levels of obesity within the population. This means, Public Health aims to track
and address changes in the health of the population and alerting people to potential
problems.
6. Developing programmes to screen for early diagnosis of disease . For example, when the GP
identifies that someone is at risk of developing diabetes due to their obesity and refers them
to a weight management programme in order to lose weight. This means, that Public Health
aims to attempt to reduce the levels of ill health by establishing new programmes that
identify people as being ‘at risk’ of a condition and occupying them in preventative
programmes. (Whitehouse, Mary et al, 2010)
7. Promoting the health of the population. For example, in obesity, they could include
campaigns encouraging people to be more active or have a healthy diet. This explains that
, Unit 8: Promoting Public Health
Public Health aims to promote health activities to reduce ill health in the population.
(Whitehouse, Mary et al, 2010)
In Public Health, there are organisations that are involved in monitoring patterns of health and ill-
health, such as the World Health Organization, which gathers information about national and
international health and ill-health and, carries out comparisons between countries. For example,
WHO encouraged Centres to analyse linked clinical and laboratory data sets to better describe the
infectious period and other clinical epidemiology of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS),
which is the study of the spread of a disease among the population. This is done by using a variety of
data collection methods, including household surveys, routine reporting by health services, civil
registration and censuses and disease surveillance systems (World Health Organization, 2014). WHO
use statistics to set priorities and then monitor the effectiveness of plans. For example, SARS is
monitored by WHO, in which they are using incidence and prevalence, they are looking at travel
plans because it is global (World Health Organization, 2003). The Department of Health receives
reports of health issues in regional authorities, and it monitors the situation with providing more
resources then, it reports the issues to the EU which reports to the WHO (Aldworth et al, 2016). For
example, the Zika virus was closely monitored like this and guidelines were set with resources to
keep the population aware of the risks and how to control infection rates.
Another organisation is The United Nations which, with 30 affiliated organisations, work towards
promoting respect for human rights, protecting the environment, fighting disease and reducing
poverty. For example, in the case of SARS, the Coordinator of the UN has driven attention to positive
developments. that they have “managed to break the cycle of transmission through the simple
implementation of case finding, contact tracing, and isolation practices in hospitals” in country after
country. this means that they have certainly hope for improvement in preventing the spread of
coronavirus around the world. (UN News, 2003) The WHO is an agency of the United Nations
concerned with international public health.
Finally, the NICE guidance provides recommendations on promoting good health and preventing ill
health. This is for people working in the NHS, local authorities, private and voluntary sectors. There
are two types of NICE guidance: the public health intervention guidance which helps to reduce
people’s risk of developing a disease or a condition, helps to promote or maintain a healthy lifestyle.
The public health programme guidance, which promotes good health and prevent ill health by
focusing on a topic for example, they focus on smoking, on population like young people or on a
setting like the workplace. In the case of the topic SARS, they may focus on a particular population
like people who travel, or on a particular setting like the airport. (World Health Organization, 2003)
In 1942, William Beveridge wrote and published a report about the
best ways of helping people on low income and proposed that all
people of working age should pay a weekly contribution in a form of
tax. In return, benefits would be paid to those who were sick,
unemployed, retired or widowed (BBC, 2005). These actions were to
create a healthy population therefore, less expenses would result in
healthcare (as in times of Beveridge, people had to pay for
healthcare), longer life expectancy and less mental illnesses. The data
states that, in late 2003, there were 60 people in six local authority
pilots, now there are 200,000 people receiving a personal budget.
(The Policy Press, 2011) For instance, it was also helpful for families as
women used to not work and if men died, women and children would
