Agenda item

To receive and oral briefing and presentation by the Director on Dorset Public Health activities and progress – particularly in respect of the Coronavirus pandemic - since the last meeting.

The Director of Public Health took the opportunity to inform the Board of what

had been done by Public Health Dorset (PHD) - in partnership with other

heath bodies GP’s; Dorset Clinical Commissioning Group; the NHS,

emergency services; and Dorset and BCP Councils - to address and manage

the Coronavirus pandemic within Dorset over recent months, what progress had been made and how the usual business of PHD was still being managed and delivered.

 

The Board was given a presentation by the Director – appended to the minutes – outlining the local outbreak management plans, how they were being applied and managed and what was being done in practice, along with other associated information pertaining to the pandemic, to put what PHD was doing – and had done - in some context.

 

The presentation covered :-

•        what 2020 had meant for PHD – in being integral and fundamental in leading response to COVID-19 across the Dorset system, as well as, amongst other things:-

- Public Health England being dis-established (from April 2021)

- introduction of Integrated Care Systems as legal entities from 2022

-Public health functions would remain with Councils

- greater responsibility for local delivery of pandemic response, supported by colossal amounts of grant funding

- a limited number of qualified public health people to draw from

·       current peak was now receding, but had been the worst yet in terms of cases and severe disease requiring hospitalisation

·       local peaks compared with the national picture

·       local delivery, regional co-ordination, national support

·       health protection and response – what had been done, how it had been done and what impact all this had on the team

·       local tracing partnerships: contact tracing

·       testing – roll out of lateral flow testing

·       vaccination – in supporting Dorset CCG to mobilise and deliver vaccinations

·       surveillance and intelligence

·       how a new model for a new year might be delivered

·       communications, engagement, and behavioural insights work

·       other issues – how business planning and re-prioritisation of work programme in the light of COVID continued to be delivered/ LiveWell roll out and success

 

Whilst, since the last meeting, two lockdowns had been imposed and case rates had risen significantly since the beginning of the new year, and had been highly concerning, the trend being now seen showed that compliance with the interventions put in place - together with the success of the vaccination programme now being seen - had achieved some considerable success and should hopefully only get better. Public Health Dorset considered that this reduction seen in Covid-19 infection rates was again pleasing to see and reflected the efforts made to manage this and the means by which this was done.

 

Nevertheless, it was of critical importance that compliance with the lockdown

rules were maintained to ensure that trend continued and that there should be

no place for complacency, or this would contribute to this trend being reversed. Household transmission remained the most significant exposure setting, followed by visiting friends and family.

 

The Director said that the infection rate (R number); cases; hospitalisations; and, resultant, deaths had all been seen to be declining significantly - and more rapidly recently - and this was due to compliance with the interventions and the vaccination programme taking effect. However, as the rates had been so high, this meant they had father to fall before being able to be of less significance but, as it stood, there was grounds for optimism and confidence that management of the crisis was good.  

 

The Panel observed that the characteristics of housing tenure and how households were being managing was integral to ensuring the continued decline in cases and officers confirmed that this was readily acknowledged and what interventions could be achieved in targeting this aspect were being deployed.

 

The Panel considered that it was good to see a more local response being activated in the management of the pandemic in terms of testing, shielding needs and vaccinations so as to have a more direct and local understanding of need and delivery. Communication was critical to ensuring the public were as well informed as they could be about what was going on and this was being done via media on line and traditional direct approach.

 

Given all that had still to be done to manage Covid, together with the normal responsibilities PHD had, the Panel recognised that the work necessary with the integrated care system should not be underestimated and needed to be managed as well as it might to ensure its delivery was as good as it could be.

 

The Board expressed its appreciation for what the whole Public Health Dorset

team had done in addressing the Covid-19 pandemic and commented that

this was a credit to the team, to local councils and their partners; to volunteers and to the residents of Dorset. They commented that this demonstrated the importance of our public health service and that Dorset and its residents were benefitting from the robust response being shown. They hoped this positive response could continue to be maintained and improved upon and looked forward – with some optimism - to seeing significant signs of improvement by the time they met again at their May meeting.