Tories launch public health push

Changes will include the replacement of alcohol units with a new easier-to-understand system, "guideline daily amount" labelling on food packages and the provision of dietary information in fast-food restaurants and bars, said shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley.

In a strong signal of the shift in priorities, the Department of Health will be renamed the Department of Public Health, with a Cabinet-level secretary of state co-ordinating a cross-government strategy also covering issues such as poverty reduction and housing conditions.

Instead of "micro-managing" NHS clinicians' daily activities, as Labour has done, the department would focus on "providing national leadership in the fight to prevent ill-health and promote well-being", said Mr Lansley.

And he called for a "new era of individual and social responsibility", in which better role models and information and the latest behavioural psychology methods will be used to encourage people to take more care of their health.

Conservative leader David Cameron denied that the approach would mean "dictating" how people live their lives.

But he said the Tories would be led by "one of the oldest pieces of medical wisdom: prevention is better than cure".

"We will not just improve our NHS so that everyone who is unwell can get the best treatment possible," said Mr Cameron in the foreword to a public health green paper.

"We will also bring in a new focus on public health to keep people well in the first place. Today, we can't escape the fact that today many of our most severe health problems are caused, in part, by the wrong personal choices. Obesity, binge-drinking, smoking and drug addiction are putting millions of lives at risk and costing our health service billions a year.

"So getting to grips with them requires an altogether different approach to the one we've seen before. We need to promote more responsible behaviour and encourage people to make the right choices about what they eat, drink and do in their leisure time."

Launching the green paper in London, Mr Lansley accused Labour of having "no effective strategy" to deal with problems such as binge-drinking and obesity or to tackle the commercial interests which feed off them.

Under Labour, public health has been given too low a priority, resulting in soaring rates of obesity, sexually-transmitted infections and drink-related deaths, he said.

Despite a raft of public health targets, Labour has left Britain with the highest teenage pregnancy rate in western Europe and the widest gap between the life expectancy of rich and poor since Victorian times.

The Tory strategy would see responsibility for tackling public health problems devolved to a local level on a payment-by-results system.

A "health premium" would target cash at poorer communities with the worst and most entrenched public health problems.

Prizes will be offered for the best suggestions for campaigns to alter people's behaviour.

Fast-food outlets and restaurants will be encouraged to provide customers with information such as calories and salt content.

n A 2.25m extension to the offices of the Bradford Institute for Health Research was announced during a visit by Mr Lansley's to the city's infirmary.

The building will house 70 research staff from NHS trusts in Bradford and universities of Bradford, Leeds and York.

The institute runs a number of high-profile public health research programmes including Born in Bradford which is one of the world's largest public health research projects, following the lives of over 10,000 families in the city.