Work Better Innovations would like to congratulate our Advisor and community development officer, Shipa Ahmed Khan, on her new role as the Health Inequalities Lead at Portsmouth Hospitals University NHS Trust. Shipa has been helping our team to make strategic and meaningful community impacts in the Portsmouth area. We look forward to growing our community work in the area of improving health equality. Below, we take a look at the importance of improving health equality in our community.
The Human Right to Quality Healthcare
The UN Sustainable Development Goal 3 is to: ‘Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages’. A healthy economy and healthy lives for all are closely linked. There is no one without the other.
The SDG declaration emphasizes that to achieve the overall health goal, ‘we must achieve universal health coverage (UHC) and access to quality health care’. However, this human right has been historically and currently impacted on by social and economic differences.
The Health Gap- a Quick Overview
Recently, the COVID 19 global pandemic has shone a harsh light on the state of inequality disproportionately affecting the health of those from the most disadvantaged groups in society: Black, Asian and minority ethnic groups (BAME), people living in areas of high deprivation, the elderly and people with a disability.
Evidence shows that those living in the most deprived areas of England face the worst healthcare inequalities in relation to healthcare access, experience and outcomes.
NHS England
Glaring statistics showed that those from minority ethnic groups were more likely, during the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic, to test positive for COVID-19, become severely ill and die. Common factors contributing to poorer health observed across vulnerable groups such as Black, Asian, asylum seekers, immigrants, financially deprived individuals, etc, are:
- income
- employment
- education
- crime
- barriers to housing and services
- living environment
Other statistics published by the Kings Fund, an organisation working alongside other institutions on the National Healthcare Inequalities Improvement Programme, show that rates of infant and maternal mortality, cardiovascular disease (CVD) and diabetes are higher among Black and South Asian groups.
Concrete Goals for a Fairer Health System
In order to better understand and combat the growing health gap between different groups in society, a national advisory group of leaders from within and beyond the NHS was established by the government in January 2021. The advisory board was tasked to provide expertise to tackle the wider structural and economic instability that were having a knock-off effect on people’s health. The group identified 8 areas for pressing action:
- Protect the most vulnerable from COVID-19
- Restore NHS services inclusively
- Develop digitally enabled care pathways in ways which increase inclusion
- Accelerate preventative programmes which proactively engage those at risk of poor health outcomes
- Particularly support those who suffer mental ill-health
- Strengthen leadership and accountability
- Ensure datasets are complete and timely
- Collaborate locally in planning and delivering action
As a dedicated community worker with extensive experience in education, mental health and community development, Shipa embodies the type of inclusive leadership needed to reflect the diversity of the NHS staff and patients. We welcome her connecting role, to help businesses, like Work Better Innovations, join community efforts to reduce health inequalities.
[Caption: A NHS infographic to show how businesses can contribute in efforts to reduce health inequality. Since so much of the root of the issue lies at the economic level, businesses have the power to improve our collective well-being.]
