Public Health Agency faces job cuts to emergency management, pandemic preparedness, Māori health

Photo: RNZ / Samuel Rillstone Twenty-one roles to go at the Public Health Agency Biggest impact in emergency management and Māori public health Union and public health experts say loss of critical expertise makes New Zealand vulnerable Health Ministry says consultation open now and any changes will be in place by April Crucial public health roles - including in emergency management, pandemic preparedness and Māori health - are on the chopping block at the Ministry of Health, with yet another restructuring under way before Christmas. The Public Service Association said the loss of skills and expertise would leave New Zealand "vulnerable", as the risk from disease and natural disasters continued to ramp up. Consultation on the changes at the Public Health Agency - the lead adviser to the government on public health and mental health - closes in just over a fortnight and any changes are expected to be in place by April. Under the proposed restructure, 21 jobs would go - the biggest number from the emergency management team, which would shrink from 11 roles to just two, and from Māori Public Health, which could drop from six staff to two. PSA national secretary Fleur Fitzsimons said the ministry had told staff the cuts were no reflection on their work, which was high quality and of vital importance. "Ultimately, this loss of deep skills and expertise to the Ministry of Health is also a huge loss for New Zealanders," she said. "The COVID pandemic showed us all how crucial planning and public health is in an emergency, and decades of research have revealed that tangata whenua face health inequities at every level of the system. "These changes make zero sense." The proposal follows cuts to public health in other areas, including the National Public Health Service, which sits under Health NZ. Its job is delivering public health services, including running immunisation programmes, responding to infectious disease outbreaks, conducting public information campaigns, and monitoring water and air quality. It was previously threatened with the loss of 55 positions, 300 vacant roles and a budget cut of $32m, but was granted a reprieve earlier this year, when Health NZ announced it had achieved "sufficient cost savings". The National Public Health Service had already undergone two major restructures in two years. Under its new proposal, the Health Ministry has also proposed what the union described as "significant changes" to the mental health, addiction and suicide prevention office, with two group manager roles disestablished and eight roles moved elsewhere. Fitzsimons said the reductions were driven by the government's "reckless" budget-cutting. "We've seen time and time again with the government's cuts that specialist teams have been broken up," she said. "When it comes to health, as our population grows and ages, we need those specialist teams with deep, specialist skills." Public health experts worried Otago University public health professor Nick Wilson said the proposed cuts were "deeply worrying" at a time when other countries were gearing up public health expertise in the face of rising threats from pandemics and climate change. "We've got increasing risk from biological spillover from the wild, but also, with humans intruding on wild spaces, that risk is increasing," he said. "We've got intensification of agriculture - we see influenza viruses from pig farms making that jump into the human population - and there's the growing concerns about bio-engineering and AI producing new pathogens. "As a country, we should be investing vastly more in pandemic preparedness." New Zealand would irrefutably see "more Cycle Gabrielles", he said. "Governments shouldn't rely on academic commentators who are just doing bits of research in their spare time - that's just too unreliable. You need lots of in-house expertise." Infectious disease expert Professor Michael Baker said the COVID-19 pandemic showed how crucial planning and public health was in an emergency. "Also, you need the right people - people with real expertise - and the problem is, with every one of these re-organisations and downsizing processes, we're losing expertise and momentum." When the Māori health authority Te Aka Whai Ora was disestablished by the government, there was a commitment that its functions and expertise would be retained in the Health Ministry and Health NZ. The cuts to the small Māori public health team put that in further doubt, Baker said. "This is a real concern, because we know there are huge health inequities for Māori in terms of life expectancy and every other measure we've got, so we need more expertise focused on reducing those disparities, rather than less." On Monday, the Wellington High Court will hear an application by Lady Tureiti Moxon, Dr Chris Tooley and Tony Kake, challenging the crown's decision to disestablish Te Aka Whai Ora on the grounds it breaches the rights of Māori, undermines tino...

Public Health Agency faces job cuts to emergency management, pandemic preparedness, Māori health

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