Joanna Ruminska sharing the Fresh Street Journey presentation.
Thrive Plymouth event, 28th November 2024, a Community Food Researcher perspective.
I attended along with two community food research colleagues, a celebration of 10 years of Plymouth City Council’s Thrive Plymouth programme and launch of the next 10 years. In my role of FoodSEqual Community Food Researcher, I was there to share the impact of FoodSEqual Health’s Fresh Street project.
Ruth Harell, outgoing Director of Public Health, Plymouth City Council opened the event, describing the Thrive Plymouth programme as a ‘social movement’ which aimed to develop the resources, networks and skills to improve the social determinants of health in the city.
Outlining the situation in Plymouth today, 10 years on from the start of Thrive, Ruth said:
- Life expectancy is static and of better quality, but only for some.
- Women’s health outcomes continue to be low, on average women in Plymouth experience 23 years of bad health.
- Obesity in young people is rising.
- Certain geographic areas in Plymouth continue to be disproportionately affected by poor health.
Sir Michael Marmot, Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health UCL and Director of UCL Institute of Health Equity and author of The Health Gap (2017), joined the event online as the keynote speaker.
In his speech Professor Marmot talked about social determinants of health in the UK. He began his speech by saying, the UK is a bad place to be poor, particularly in the regions outside of London, where UK GDP per person drops by 14% (when London is excluded), compared to 2% in other wealthy European countries. Prof Marmot highlighted that life expectancy did not improve between 2009 and 2023, in fact healthy life expectancy worsened for the poorest people, particularly women. He attributes this to social determinants of health (the non-medical factors that influence health) rather than access to healthcare.
Despite these challenges, local initiatives are making a difference by addressing social determinants of health. Marmot Places work with the Institute of Health Equity and recognise that health and health inequalities are mostly shaped by the social determinants of health (SDH) defined as the conditions in which people are born, grow, live, work and age. These places take action to improve health and reduce health inequalities by supporting sectors to work together to reduce inequalities and improve overall health equity.
Cities and areas which have declared themselves Marmot Places, include Greater Manchester, Cheshire and Merseyside, Liverpool, the North of Tyne Combined Authority, Northumberland, Newcastle, Wales, Waltham Forest, and the Southwest Region, where Plymouth is located.
Impact of difficult economic conditions on Health Inequalities: Professor Marmot highlighted the impact of austerity measures on health inequalities, noting that shorter life expectancy aligns with steeper reduction in local government spending. Overall central government support for local government went down by 59% over the decade, where the greater the need of a population, the more money was taken away.
He argued that health inequalities got bigger due to political decisions, with child poverty increasing and fewer adults believing that today’s children will have a better life than them. He highlights that social mobility is lower in both the UK and the US than in most other European countries, due to bigger income inequalities and lack of investment in children.
Conclusion: Professor Marmot’s speech provided new and interesting ways to think about the work of FoodSEqual in Whitleigh, Plymouth in particular the Fresh Street project, where participants’ feedback indicates that the social connections the project created were of equal importance to the fresh fruit and vegetables and vouchers we provided. Joanna Ruminska, FoodSEqual.
Find out more about the impact of Fresh Street here: Fresh Street Journey
and Marmot Places; https://www.instituteofhealthequity.org/taking-action/marmot-places
