Agenda item

Report of Liz Gaulton, Director of Public Health and Wellbeing (to be circulated)

The Board considered a report of Liz Gaulton, Director of Public Health and Wellbeing which presented the Director of Public Heath’s Annual Report 2020-2021, ‘Connecting through Covid-19 – Making a difference by working together in unprecedented times’. A copy of the report was set out at an appendix to the report.

The report focused on the value of relationships and connecting with people and communities. It offered a reflection on the city’s approach to engagement and working with communities through the pandemic and demonstrated how this had shaped the Covid-19 response, recovery and ongoing defence. The report brought together data that showed the impact of Covid-19 on the City and provided an overview of the Council's strategy on communications and engagement. It demonstrated how services and the response was guided by community-led activity. The report’s findings were informed by statistical figures, performance reports and evaluations from the Council and partners.

The report set out the following five recommendations for improvement and future practice, with learning the lessons from experiences gained during the pandemic benefitting the way work would be undertaken in the future:

i) Harness the work of the Community Messengers approach established during our Covid-19 response, as an ongoing method of working with communities and a central component of engagement for public health and wider programmes.

ii) Build on the engagement structures created and strengthened during the pandemic such as the Places of Worship and Community Centre Network, and grass-roots community organisations who were funded to support COVID-19 response efforts. Further understand the reach of these community organisations and networks to enable the targeting of work in areas with limited availability of community resource.

iii) Strengthen the existing relationships with GPs, other health professionals and those working with populations at higher risk of a range of poorer health outcomes due to inequality, deprivation, ethnicity and underlying health conditions – building upon the work started through the Vaccinating Coventry Programme.

iv) Embed the partnership approach to maintaining local Covid-19 defence, led by Coventry City Council’s Public Health working collaboratively with UK Health Security Agency and in partnership with the wider Council and ‘One Coventry’ partners. Embed the partnership approach to maintaining local Covid-19 defence, led by Coventry City Council’s Public Health working collaboratively with UK Health Security Agency and in partnership with the wider Council and ‘One Coventry’ partners.

v) Establish strong Covid-19 recovery workstreams with ‘One Coventry’ partners and communities to embed a robust and coherent recovery for the City, with the aim of building a better future for all.

The report also set out the recommendations from the Director of Public Health’s 2019-2020 report and provided a progress update on the actions undertaken to date.

Members were informed that any comments on the Annual Report were to be e-mailed to the Director of Public Health and Wellbeing.

RESOLVED that:

(1) The report’s findings be noted.

(2) The recommendations from the 2020-2021 Director of Public Health’s Annual report be endorsed.

(3) The progress on recommendations from the 2019-2020 Director of Public Health’s Annual report be noted.