Inventing our future Collective action for a sustainable economy

What the Strategy does not address…
1.9 The focus of this Strategy is health and health inequalities within the East of England, not the NHS or
health service delivery. From the outset it is important to be clear that the Strategy does not therefore
focus on:
• Issues relating to employment, labour supply or working conditions in the health and social
care sector specifically – whether that is part of the NHS, the private sector or the community/
voluntary sector 9
• The performance, in economic terms, of the health and social care sector, or the scope for
improving that performance 10
• The actual or potential impacts of the NHS on the regional economy through, for example,
procurement practices
• The nature or implications of changing arrangements with regard to the delivery of NHS services
in the East of England.
1.10 All four of the issues raised above are important, and all four merit strategic consideration at a regional
scale. However from the outset, the intention has been that Healthy Futures should focus solely on
the health of people and inequalities in health within the East of England. Hence these allied issues
are not addressed here although their significance is noted.
Structure of this document
1.11 In Chapter 2, we provide a summary statement of the policy context for Healthy Futures, drawing
both on the range of strategies for the East of England and the national policy context. Key to this
is the White Paper, Choosing Health, which was published by the DH in 2004.
1.12 Thereafter, the document is divided into three main sections, each of which is sub-divided into
a number of chapters.
• Section A provides the backdrop to the Strategy by summarising the evidence base. It describes
the health of people in the East of England (Chapter 3) and provides an analysis of the factors
which are determining the health of people in the Region (Chapter 4)
• Section B sets out the Regional Health Strategy for the East of England. In Chapter 5, a Vision
for the health of people in the East of England is presented and three high level Themes are
introduced. These are examined in more detail in subsequent chapters, each of which outlines
three Strategic Priorities and a number of accompanying Actions
• Section C explains the processes through which Healthy Futures will be delivered, linking with
Local Area Agreements at a local level, through to the delivery structures for Choosing Health
and for the priorities set out in the Integrated Regional Strategy at a regional scale. It also
explains how the progress of the Strategy will be monitored over the years ahead.
9 These issues are a concern: health and social care is a low paying sector and low pay is correlated with poor health. But low pay in the health
and social care sector is no more of a focus for this Strategy than, for example, low pay and poor working conditions in the agricultural and
tourism industries.
10 Health and social care is one of the largest sectors of the economy and it is growing quickly; it has been identified as a key sector in the
Regional Economic Strategy.
A Regional Health Strategy for the East of England 17