A Forgotten Strategy ?

I stubbled across something very interesting!! A 'New Zealand Health Strategy 2000.' Yes, it has been over 10 years since this document has been published and not many people have even heard of it.

This strategy focuses on all aspects of health including, lowering suicide rates, improving oral health and reducing the impact of cancer, among many others. Ok, fair enough, a good broad scope providing local authorities and wide-view into the problems associated with the ENTIRE health sector.

In this document, the Ministry of Health (MoH) support and stress on the fact that inequalities have a massive impact on the health and well-being of people (MoH, 2000: 4). This is also recognised in the document as a priority that should be reduced (MoH, 2000: 13).

Many of the high priority objectives include;

• reducing smoking
• improving nutrition
• reducing inequalities
• reducing obesity
• increasing the level of physical activity
• and many others

(MoH, 2000: 13)

In many cases, there are some aspects as a result of this strategy (which can be seen as a planning document) that have been focused on greatly since the year 2000. These include:

• Smoking Reduction Actions : we've all seen the advertisements on TV, media coverage of the issue, the sick images on smoking packages, national campaign supported by other media (phone service/support, websites/forums and subsidies)

Smoke Free TV campaign using famous faces and names to help people quit (Source: Capital and Coast DHB, 2008)

Pictures on Cigarette Packages (Source: News Medical, 2007)

• Improving Nutrition : only recently have I really seen the advertisements on TV into good food and nutrition but it is constantly covered as an issue in NZ communities. It is also related greatly to inequalities in society (refer to previous blog post).

• Reducing Obesity and Improving Physical Activity : once again, media advertisements and programmes being launched (SPARC 30 Minutes push play) to help both these aspects and it has been presented to a specific target audience (refer to previous blog post)

Most Recent 'Push Play Initiative' (Source: SPARC, 2011)

Many of the inequalities identified relate to Maori health, as they have been identified as the most affected by severe health issues in NZ (MoH, 2000: 18). Many of the solutions proposed by central Government at the time was aimed at educating Maori, and Pasifika, on health and well-being issues.

The document goes onto indicate that it is only an "overarching framework for action on health" and that  it "does not identify how specific priority objectives or services will be addressed" (MoH, 2000: 31). This seems to indicate that the document is basically a wordy document which reports on issues but has no real plan of action. This may, however, be suitable because it is a national strategy and the idea of 'local issues, local solutions' need to be applied to individual areas.

All in all, a really good indication by the Government, however, it is a planning document that doe snot seem to have much significance in NZ. A reason this has not been updated is maybe because there has been slow progress on the issue and many of the stats are still similar. Only an assumption but something to think about....