Letter

Learn from success

With all the press attention on NHS treatment services, many feel that it is impossible to gain attention for ‘upstream thinking’. Some even sink into despair, blaming all the usual suspects – journalists, New Labour, public apathy, capitalism, etc.

But food and health campaigning has shown great success. Until very recently public health campaigners, including school teachers, were denounced as health fascists by the likes of the Daily Mail for raising concerns over junk foods and drinks being sold to children.

As the facts around obesity gained media attention there was always a risk that the ‘individual choice lobby’ — often represented by shadowy commercial and political bodies — would win the day. Well, they haven’t.

Today there is a groundswell of opinion which says that NHS facilities, schools and other publicly-owned settings should be free of vending machines selling sugary fizzy drinks. At the Department of Health’s Food and Health Action Plan conference in February a mixed group of individuals, some from public health backgrounds but others from Sainsbury’s, Tesco’s, and other retailers agreed that such machines should be removed from schools and other settings. The lesson is that we can build alliances with many in industry around public health goals.

What we desperately need is to extend activism into the neglected areas of public health using similar well conceived and coordinated styles of campaigning, allied to clear messages with broad public appeal. In other words what we need is a professional, serious and thoughtful public health movement free of the sectarianism of professional or organisational rivalries.