[g8-sheffield] Closing the health gap in Sheffield - Thursday 21st October

[Jason]

Dear all, this is a notice for a public meeting on closing the health
gap in Sheffield. More details attached and below. Please forward
these details as you feel appropriate.

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Your money and your life?
Closing the health gap in Sheffield
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7pm Thursday 21st October at Sheffield Cathedral

Chaired by the Sheffield Equality Group, this meeting will discuss
closing the health gap in Sheffield with two leading writers on health
in the City: Dr Jeremy Wight, Director of Public Health in Sheffield;
and, Danny Dorling, professor of Human Geography at the University of
Sheffield. While investment in public health has improved overall
health, it has not reduced the health gap between better off areas and
poorer ones. A key question for all those present at the meeting, will
be around what policy or policies will act best to close the health
gap, when so many have apparently failed. One proposal will be
reducing the gap between high paid and low paid, which has been found
to improve health outcomes for all.

Jeremy Wight has worked in the NHS in Sheffield and Yorkshire since
1985,initially in hospital medicine including kidney disease, and
since 1992 in public health. In 2006 he was appointed Director of
Public Health for the (newly formed) Sheffield PCT, jointly appointed
with the City Council.  Jeremy is also an honorary Senior Lecturer in
Public Health Medicine at ScHARR, University of Sheffield. He is
responsible for leading on public health in the city, where health
inequality is an "overriding public health concern", and a key focus
of the strategic plans on public health in the city.

Danny Dorling has been a professor of Human Geography at the
University of Sheffield since 2003. He is a leading figure in the
mapping of social structures and inequalities. He is also a member of
the World Health Organization's Scientific Resource Group on health
Equity Analysis and Research. "Politicians usually say they want a
fairer society. They may mean it. Only by looking at what has happened
during their time in power can we tell if they have achieved it. Few
argue that a fairer society should see inequalities in health rising.
In this talk I'll look at what the last government achieved in terms
of health inequalities and what the preferences of the current
government appear to be".

For more details, please see http://wp.me/p124sa-2B
or phone 07956 384142

Yours faithfully,

Jason Leman
Secretary
Sheffield Equality Group