The Cheshire and Merseyside Directors of Public and Population Health met for their System Leadership meeting on Friday 25th July. You can read the key messages along with items of good news and gratitude on our website by using the link below.
- Child Poverty Unit visit – The national Child Poverty Unit visited Sefton last week to listen to families affected by poverty and hear about the local and collaborative work to reduce child and family poverty in Cheshire and Merseyside. The visit was attended by a range of senior stakeholders who took part in a roundtable discussion on how the devastating impacts of poverty on health and the economy can be reduced. The Head of the Child Poverty Unit thanked families and colleagues for sharing their experiences and confirmed their plan to feed in what they have learned into the forthcoming national strategy.
- South Korea team plan visit to Cheshire and Merseyside – A visit by the Korean Institute of Child Care and Education is planned for 6th August and will be hosted by Cheshire West and Chester Council. The Korean team want to learn more about the All Together Fairer programme and Cheshire and Merseyside’s approach to tackling child poverty.
- Whole system approach to healthy weight – The Directors heard a proposal, presented by the Associate Director of Population Health in the ICB, from the Beyond Children and Young People’s programme. The programme proposed would upskill the public health and wider workforce on a whole system approach (including system leadership) to reducing overweight and obesity in children. The Directors agreed to discuss the proposal further at a future meeting.
- Population health update – The ICB met last week for sessions on neighbourhoods and logic model development. There was also a presentation on flu vaccination for health care professionals, following recent insight gathered in Cheshire and Merseyside. The rise in Measles cases is a priority and there is a new dashboard for MMR uptake which has been delivered. The Directors thanked colleagues in the ICB for the development of the MMR dashboard.
- UKHSA North West – Measles is the key focus for UKHSA with the North West seeing an increase in new cases and further confirmed cases being seen in Cheshire and Merseyside. A press release from UKHSA and the NHS will be published imminently, and a briefing note will follow on the UKHSA Single Service Centre for Measles.
- NHS 10-year plan – The Directors had a discussion on the key points in the NHS 10-year plan, welcoming action on prevention. They agreed to review, with the North West DsPH group, areas where advocating for further action was needed, particularly around reducing harm from alcohol.
- Collaborative delivery plan – The 2025-27 strategic delivery plan for Champs Public Health Collaborative was reviewed and agreed. The plan is an iterative document setting out programme aims and objectives and will be updated as programme needs change. Updates on progress will be presented to the Directors’ Executive Board in April and October
- Directors and senior leaders strategic planning session – Directors and senior leaders met at the end of June to look at the opportunities and challenges with Devolution. The day included presentations from the Mayoral Regions Programme and Dr Ruth Hussey from NHS Cheshire and Merseyside.
- Good news and gratitude – The Directors shared items of good news and gratitude:
- Well done to all involved in the Child Poverty Unit visit, particularly the Sefton team who hosted the day.
- Halton Council have recently been involved in a breastfeeding project and will have a poster presentation on the project featured at the European Public Health conference.
- Sefton ran a public consultation for their health and wellbeing strategy, with Liverpool John Moores University, which had good representation.
- A blog from Professor Matthew Ashton – Director of Public Health for Liverpool and lead DPH for the Collaborative’s All Together Fairer programme – on poverty and health inequalities was published in the Municipal Journal.
