Public Health in Wales: Why sport can no longer sit on the sidelines
Public Health in Wales: Why sport can no longer sit on the sidelines
Welsh NHS Confederation Conference 16th January 2014
I think it’s only appropriate to start by recognising the work that the 4000 other Young Ambassadors are undertaking across Wales. They never fail to inspire me with their creativity and energy and I have no doubt that we’ll be seeing some of them leading our future workforce. These are Young people taking personal responsibility for their own health and the well being of their friends and family. I thank them all for the work they are doing to create fun and accessible opportunities across the Wales.
Engaging children and young people in our work is just one way in which Sport Wales is seeking to create a step change in levels of participation in Wales. Forging new partnerships, based on shared outcomes and common messages, is a pressing priority with budgets reducing and savings having to be made. We all have to confront the challenges facing our agendas to deliver better outcomes on less resource. It is now more than ever we must not bury our heads in the sand we must seize the opportunity to do things differently and to look for innovative solutions to these challenges.
The health problems facing Wales have been well documented, in particular around what have been deemed preventable illnesses. It is becoming increasingly clear that one of the biggest public health threats is a lack of physical activity. I believe that the solution to improved preventative health lies in better collaboration across the sectors and in particular between Sport, Health and Education.
Sport Wales’ remit is to increase participation in sport for everyone, but we have prioritised work with Young People and have set the aspirations to get every child hooked on sport for life, we have focused on the young to ensure they develop good habits and positive perceptions of sport in their formative years, knowing that if we can built these positive habits and behaviours as young people they are more likely to stay fit and active later on in life. By achieving this we are, what you may call, a public health agency ourselves, working across all communities to boost levels of activity and health.
I’m going to use this speech today to highlight some ways we in sport are tackling these challenges, as well as the type of approaches we could be looking at in the future. At the heart of my message is that we have a collective role in creating a active and healthy nation. The goal is a hugely enticing one, one that should motivate every one of us in public service- creating a small nation that doesn’t just support sport from the stands or the sofa but one that places exercise and sport at the very heart of our national culture.
But first, let me vent some frustrations– some people tell me that Sport is only for ‘Sporty’, or if you want to work with other sectors such as health you must not use the term, sport. How did Sport become a “dirty” word? If we reinforce this nonsense, we are in danger of disengaging the people we want to work with or to closing our mind to opportunities of working together before they have been explored. So let me please ask you that when we or others use the word sport, please remind yourself that we are talking about physical activity from zumba and yoga to five a side football, - getting people active and healthy and dare I say it making people happy and prosperous – acknowledging one of the primary benefits of participating in sport is also mental wellbeing.
I know I feel at my most relaxed when I throw on my running kit and set out for a run or more of a gentle plod these days around Pontcanna fields. It really does feel like I’m tidying up all my thoughts and I’m sure I have my best ideas when I’m out running. I know from others as well that they use physical activity to manage the stresses and strains of our very busy life’s and I am certainly seeing more and more people, of all shapes and sizes, running and cycling on the routes that I take the majority taking more of a social approach, exercising with their friends.
For us at Sport Wales we are promoting a sporting landscape which is rooted in creating activity that is fun for all participants. We recently undertook a survey of School Sport across Wales and an incredible 110,000 young people gave us their views of school sport – this is probably the largest survey of its kind in the world – children telling us what they liked and don’t like about school sport – the overwhelming positive message - if you want us to do more activity then it must build our confidence, make us feel more able to do other activities and be fun– (I suspect this is not different for all of us in the room today )
So the young people of Wales have spoken and it is now over to us to listen. We are already working closely with colleagues in education to create a generation of children and young people who are equipped like no other to be more active. For the last ten years we have invested in a range of school programmes such as Dragon Sport and 5 x60 that have sought to build basic skills and grow confidence and a passion for sport amongst our young people. Most recently we have been driving forward the importance of physical literacy in our schools. Physical literacy can be a term that some find intimidating when actually it is quite straightforward, but rather than have me explain it I know someone who can demystify this in a much more effective way....
Now that’s how to tell us! This film has received excellent feedback from a range of organisations internationally; we are in discussions with Canada on how they can use it to promote physical literacy to their population. It has also been interesting to see that our Canadian colleagues are giving a high priority to building a physically literate nation and are looking to use activity as a “prescription” for some of the health issue they face - recognising that it is vitally important to explore ways to use exercise to reduce the prescribing bill.
There is positive news in the activity levels of children and young people in Wales with a significant increase in regular physical activity from 27% in 2011 to 40% in 2013. However we also know that the levels of obesity are rising in school age children and those in our most deprived communities participate less frequently than those in more affluent areas. If we are to prevent this tsunami I hear so much about then we need to look at prevention more seriously.
Education, Health and Sport are the three sides of the triangle that by working together at a local level can deliver the preventative solutions to stop the tsunami.
We recently made a call to the wider sector to work with us to address these inequalities, committing three million pound to find new solutions and new partners. I will now highlight briefly two examples.
Knowing that the health sector is guaranteed to come into contact with every disabled person in Wales we have invested in a new £180,000 three year partnership between Betsi Cadwaladr and Disability Sport Wales. The project focuses on making the links between the health professionals and local sporting opportunities to enable a seamless transition into appropriate local activities. Recognising not only the health benefits in increasing their activity levels but also recognising the more social aspects of being involved with sport.
Further this to we have also invested in a tripartite £170,000 progamme with RCT LA and RCT homes, a completely new partner for us in Sport Wales, to support the employment of three Family activity advisors to provide sporting opportunities for their tenants and developing training for the staff to enable them to advise on opportunities for the families to get involved with local activity.
We are also exploring models outside of Wales -the Be Active scheme in Birmingham where collaborative working between health and local leisure services has seen an increase in the number of adults accessing leisure services and improving their health. The evaluation of the scheme demonstrated significant savings to the public purse and using the Quality Adjusted Life Year (QALY) indicator, (that is quite a mouthful) which I'm sure you are all aware of, the programme is £1,164.60 far below the £20,000 threshold used by NICE to determine its effectiveness. Would this be a model that could work for us in Wales or could there be some learning here that together we could apply.
At Sport Wales we have been using the WhatMoves You? campaign as a way of promoting sport to women in a new way, as a fun, social activity and it is showing some promising signs of reaching a new audience and recognising the work place as key environment to promote activity. I suspect we all know that we need to take more personal responsibility for our own health and therefore incorporating activity into everyone’s life patterns is going to be key.
I know I am very lucky that at Sport Wales we have changing rooms, showers and somewhere safe to leave my bike. Imagine if all employees had access to a similar set up – making it easier and encouraging people to make that step. The whole of the public sector in Wales can be standard bearers for physical activity, not only for their health but as a way of creating a team ethos across organisations. I know that there are pockets of great practice out there, but now is the time more than ever we need to make this the norm.
I have resisted mentioning performance sport, but it would be remiss of me not to mention the impact of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. I will never forget the splendour and inspiration of the Opening Ceremony . Showcasing everything that is great about the UK and to see the NHS (created by Wales’s own pioneer of public health, Nye Bevan) right at the centre of this, with the children bouncing on the hospital beds, is something I’m sure you are all very proud of. We similarly feel very proud of what Sport has to offer and, as an aside, these Games were the most successful Games in the modern era for Welsh athletes winning seven Olympic and 15 Paralympic medals - nearly 12 % of the medal haul with 5 % of the population including six golds. We now have another chance for Welsh athletes to shine on the world stage at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games in July this year. We are working with all our partners to ensure that any child or young person who is inspired can access an opportunity to get involved in sport.
Back to the here and now, I’m here today to begin a conversation about what effective collaboration between the health and sport sectors could look like. If we are to create a more physically active and thus a healthier Wales then we need to be looking at more integrated and innovative solutions. We see sport as an area that has been sat on the sidelines of the national debate about public health for too long, maybe this is due to my original comments about the perception of sport and we must therefore change this.
We are confident of the role sport can play in tackling some of the health challenges we as a nation face and are keen to make the links. We know the passion of our nation for our teams and athletes, but we want to change the playing field. We want Wales to be known not only for the success our elite athletes, but as an healthy and prosperous nation where being active is the norm.
Thank you
If you would like to share examples of sport and health working together, please let us know! And what do you think? Is it a good idea for sport and health to work together more closely?
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