734 Results

  • Unaffordable home heating increases risk of severe mental distress

    … mental health outcomes for our population. Cold housing is a significant public health issue in many countries. 1-3 Cold … But we are now seeing more evidence that it can have a negative impact on mental health as well. What does the … initially, the odds of reporting severe mental distress after becoming unable to keep the home adequately warm almost …
    Briefing

  • Public Health Solutions Series: Good health in childhood is vital for lifelong wellbeing: time for a preventive approach

    … This blog looks at solutions t o improve child health : a child impact lens on policy, lifting income support, action … many children and whānau and placed even more pressure on a health system. This pressure makes it challenging for the … be geared towards child wellbeing and preventive health . A key task for policy-makers is for Aotearoa to make a …
    Briefing

  • High regret among people who smoke reinforces strong support for smokefree legislation

    … mandate to repeal the SERPA Act, but doing so would create a policy vacuum that fails to support the aspirations of … Act 2022 (SERPA). As we explained in an earlier briefing , a 2023 survey of 3414 16 to 29 year olds found very large … the coalition government proposed repealing the SERPA Act. After the coalition agreement details became public, and …
    Briefing

  • BMI keeps on going up – and reflections on the Diabesity Symposium

    … in BMI is linear, relentless increasing; no sign of a plateau, yet. Given this trend, The Diabesity Crisis … research and policy priorities? The Ministry of Health has a very user friendly tool for accessing Health Survey data , … do they compare with past trends? There is nothing like a long time series to gain an understanding about …
    Briefing

  • A Whakawhanaungatanga Māori Wellbeing Model – guiding better housing and urban development

    … ownership and private rental. Consequently Māori make up a significant proportion of public housing tenants. … New Zealand Centre for Sustainable Cities have developed A Whakawhanaungatanga Māori Wellbeing Model for Housing and … individual and group characteristics, with culture being a key factor. 1  This awareness has led to transformations in …
    Briefing

  • Ten things we can learn from new smoking and vaping data about progress to Smokefree Aotearoa 2025

    … goal is not yet clear. Introduction This blog provides a summary of some key points from the 2018-19 NZ Health … to be achieved for Māori, and is likely to be missed by a very large margin. Figure 2: Daily smoking among Māori … in quit rates by ethnicity and socio-economic status. After some initial promising reductions in uptake among young …
    Briefing

  • The health impacts of the First World War for NZ: A Review

    … health impacts. Impact for military personnel who left NZ A summary of the health impacts for military personnel who … kept dying from war-related causes for many years after the end of the war. Such deaths were because of their … of military personnel from the whole war (including deaths after the armistice) 18,166 Still not counted in this total …
    Briefing

  • Smartphone apps for weight loss and smoking cessation

    … and smoking cessation well-designed? We were involved in a study published in last Friday’s NZ Medical Journal that tried to answer that question from a NZ public health perspective. In this blog we discuss what … price signals (e.g., tobacco tax increases [2,3]) and a healthier food environment (prices, marketing controls, and …
    Briefing

  • Good news on declining smoking rates, especially for Māori. Is it credible? What next?

    … what else could be done to accelerate progress towards a smokefree nation.   Statistics New Zealand has released … current smokers on Census night in March of 2013.  That is a fall in the absolute number of smokers of 22.6% since 2006 … growth in the adult population between censuses, that is a 24.4% fall (or a 4.4 percentage point fall) in the smoking …
    Briefing

  • Smoking prevalence and trends: important findings from the 2023-24 New Zealand Health Survey

    … were released on 19 November. For the first time in a decade, the prevalence of daily smoking did not decline in … living in the most deprived areas, we will not reach a daily smoking prevalence of less than 5% for all population … of 'current smoking' defined as smoking monthly or more often. The figures below show trends in current smoking over …
    Briefing

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Public Health Expert Briefing (ISSN 2816-1203)