Combating health inequalities

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Ahead of the Wolfson Research Institute parliamentary reception, Roberta Blackman-Woods discusses the work of the Institute on a regional, national and international level.

The Wolfson Research Institute will host a parliamentary receptionon Tuesday to promote its work in research into human health and wellbeing, an event that you will be sponsoring.

Could you tell us a little bit about your involvement with Wolfson and why their work is of such importance?

The Institute is part of Durham University; it's one of the multi-disciplinary research institutes there.

The Institute is very important because some of the work that it does, for example looking at health inequality and wider determinants of public health, is really relevant, particularly to the North East.

I am eager for parliamentarians to understand more about the work of the Wolfson Research Institute. I do believe that if the Institute was to receive a higher profile would be genuinely beneficial for all.

What will the reception entail? What will be the key points of discussion?

There will be two key points of discussion – health inequalities and wellbeing.

In terms of health inequality, the event will seek to really influence the parliamentary agenda. We will debate what changes might need to take place in terms of the delivery of health, and how we can seek to combat widening health inequality across the nation.

We will also discuss what wellbeing is and attempt to determine how best to measure this. Wellbeing is a term that we hear used a great deal, but when you ask parliamentarians, academics and the general public what it actually means, there is no real consensus.

Through what methods does the Wolfson Institute seek to inform government policy?

Through a great number of ways.

Clearly it is a research institute, so it carries out research that is funded externally. It publishes academic papers, its members attend academic conferences, and they write books. But it also really tries to reach out to the wider policymaking community, both at a local and regional level and in Parliament.

For example, the Institute sends key findings to government ministers and, in particular, keeps channels of communication open with the department minister for of public health.

The Wolfson Institute has a key focus on international health. How does this manifest itself?

The Institute is based in Stockton on Tees and is part of Durham University, so it has a strong grounding in North East England.

What the Institute does is to put the North East within an international context. It does this by looking at regions that might be more peripheral within particular countries and have to deal with quite complex health problems. The Institute then determines what particular action may need to be taken because of the historic nature of the specific regional health problems, or because of external factors such as the correlation between low income and poor health.

I believe that this is a useful and innovative thing to do. It highlights how the North East is positioned from an international perspective, and enables health policymakers in the UK to think about what they should be doing with some of the nation's regions outside of London and the South East.

There has been much talk about a government-backed health and wellbeing index. Does this idea have value?

I believe it does have value, and would probably be a quite a useful thing to do. However, its value depends on how it is constructed. My colleague, Andy Burnham, commented earlier this week about the index, arguing that happiness may well prove very difficult to measure and may even trivialise mental health problems.

Ultimately, as with everything, it depends on what the detail looks like.

Why are you so concerned about health inequalities at the moment in the UK?

I represent a constituency where life expectancy is a few years less than other regions – the South East of England, for example.

That is partly historical, because of the North East's industrial heritage, which has undeniably contributed to a preponderance of diseases that lead to premature mortality. However, there is also a connection between lower incomes, which we see in the North East, and overall health. Lower incomes tend to affect things like diet and access to leisure.

I do think we need to look at health determinants in a much wider context than just the food that somebody eats. That's obviously important, but the wider community that people live in, their lifestyles, incomes and the opportunities that are available to them are also key indicators of how healthy a person is likely to be.

It does seem to me that having Wolfson's work in these areas is very helpful.