HENRY: The family 'lifeline' tackling obesity in Bradford's most deprived areas

The 36-year-old is one of the mothers attending a programme at the Woodroyd Centre in Bradford designed to help reduce the number of overweight and obese children living in the most deprived areas of the city.

Her son's condition on the autism spectrum and the fact he doesn't like textures makes providing him with a healthy and balanced diet a difficult task.

But speaking during the latest session of the eight-week healthy lifestyle course, Mrs Majid said she and her family were already reaping the benefits.

If we get our children used to healthy eating at this age with lots of fruit and vegetables they won’t say no in the future because it will be a habit" - Saeema Majid

“I have learnt so much and I am definitely eating healthier and my children are as well,” the stay-at-home mother explained.

"Bradford needs this because if we get our children used to healthy eating at this age with lots of fruit and vegetables they won’t say no in the future because it will be a habit.”

The scheme, delivered by leading UK early intervention charity HENRY and the National Lottery funded programme Better Start Bradford,has a focus on promoting positive early childhood development and giving youngsters the best start in life.

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It educates participants on how to develop healthy lifestyle habits including food, activity, and families’ daily routines. It is provided in small groups of up to 12 parents in local community and children’s centres, or on a one-to-one basis in the home.

Currently the healthy families group courses, which run throughout the year, can only be accessed by residents who live in the Better Start Bradford areas of Little Horton, Bradford Moor, Bowling and Barkerend, due to funding.

Nicola Charnock, HENRY service co-ordinator for Better Start Bradford, stressed the need to expand the current programmes due to the chronic health problems that exist within Bradford.

This includes high rates of obesity and diabetes in both adults and children, poor oral health, particularly tooth decay, in children and high rates of deprivation.

There is a lot of deprivation in Bradford, it is harder for families to find ways to live a healthy lifestyle when they can’t afford to go to activity groups and when they can’t budget in terms of healthy eating" - Nicola Charnock, Better Start Bradford

"This work is vital," the 32-year-old said. "We are working in the field of prevention... if we can prevent some of the issues later on in life such as diabetes and obesity, that is going to cost the NHS in the long run so much less.

"If you don’t invest in that prevention early on, you are just waiting for problems to happen."

She said more must be done to bring deprived areas in the North up to the level of good health enjoyed by people living in London and the South East.

"There is a lot of deprivation in Bradford, it is harder for families to find ways to live a healthy lifestyle when they can’t afford to go to activity groups and when they can’t budget in terms of healthy eating," she said.

The Henry Programme, Woodroyd Centre, Bradford. Staff, mothers and children at the centre. Picture: Simon Hulme

At a time when a desire to 'level up' the UK by boosting the northern economy is repeated like a mantra across government, the need to improve the long-term health of the region with schemes like those in Bradford is not always given top priority.

But according to the Northern Health Science Alliance, which represents research intensive universities, NHS teaching trusts and northern Academic Health Science Networks, policy-makers neglect it at their peril.

As its 2018 Health for Wealth report points out, 30 per cent of the £4 per person per hour gap in productivity between the Northern Powerhouse and the rest of England is due to ill-health, meaning that reducing this gap could generate an extra £13.2bn a year for the economy.

There are a number of striking examples of how the North's comparative ill-health holds the region back.

On average if someone in the North experiences a spell of ill-health, they are 39 per cent more likely to lose their job than someone in the rest of England. And if they do get back to work, their wages will be 66 per cent lower.

The Henry Programme, Woodroyd Centre, Bradford. Olga Dolganiuc pictured with her one-year-old son David. Picture: Simon Hulme

Though health rates vary across the region - generally in line with average earnings - there is a gap in life expectancy of two years between the North and the rest of the country, while premature death rates are 20 per cent higher.

In a letter to the Prime Minister seen by The Telegraph & Argus, hospital chief executives and university medical school heads argue that this disparity is being driven in part by a lack of health research funding for the region.

As in other areas of the economy, the so-called 'golden triangle' of London, Oxford and Cambridge dominates, raking in some 60 per cent of the billions of pounds handed out in public and private research funding each year. In total just £21 is spent per person on health innovation and research in the North each year compared to a £62 average in the 'golden triangle'.

While London on its own takes in 31.8 per cent of the funding, Leeds gets just 1.9 per cent, Sheffield 1.4 per cent and Manchester 3.5 per cent.

Health research funding may be less obviously beneficial to a local area than new trains or buses, but the NHSA argues that it benefits patients by giving them access to cutting-edge health innovation. And there is a well-documented 'virtuous circle' where the jobs and expertise brought to an area make it more economically prosperous, in turn leading to a healthier population.

Oxford, Cambridge and London are the country's best-known centres for health research, with the capacity and infrastructure to support a high proportion of the UK’s efforts in this area.

Northern centres are hoping to muscle in on their turf and take advantage of their expertise in health technology and applied health research, taking innovative health ideas and working out how best to deliver them to patients.

But they fear the current funding model from government and other funding bodies is more weighted to pharmaceutical research, where money is spent developing drugs to treat existing diseases.

Around half this funding comes from national bodies such as the Medical Research Council, UK Research and Innovation and the National Institute for Health Research, while the other half comes from industry.

Professor Paul Stewart, Executive Dean of the Faculty of Medicine & Health at the University of Leeds, who co-signed the letter to the PM, said the case for a change of direction should be made on the basis of quality, not the North feeling it hasn't had a fair crack of the whip.

He said: "Where we are with some of our health technology applications, particularly in Leeds, is we're turning that dial to disease prevention to early diagnosis, with a more dramatic and immediate impact on human health.

"That's the exciting bit where I think we've got a real head of steam. And like all governments, they want to see an evidence base for that."

Leeds is already responsible for some eye-catching innovations which have benefitted the local NHS and patients.

The Leeds Care Record, one of the most digitally advanced electronic health records across the UK, provides medics from GPs to staff at hospitals, nursing homes and even hospices the most up-to-date information about a patient.

Prof Stewart said the strength the Leeds City Region already has in the field of medical technology could bring in thousands of extra jobs and more than £1bn to the economy in the next decade.

And the university's state-of-the-art Nexus building, which boasts a number of firms specialising in the application of artificial intelligence to health, is already 70 per cent full just a few months after opening.

"We've got to be shouting about this," says Professor Stewart. "As Yorkshiremen we don't crow about stuff, but this is a real asset that we've got to bring to the fore in terms of our potential here."

Investment needed

A LACK of investment in vital research and innovation in northern England is stifling economic growth and helping to widen the North-South health divide, senior university and NHS leaders warn the Prime Minister today.

A letter to Boris Johnson signed by 22 of the region's hospital chief executives and university medical school heads says just £21 is spent per person on health innovation and research in the North compared to a £62 average in the so-called 'golden triangle' of London, Oxford and Cambridge.

In a challenge to the PM's levelling-up agenda, they argue that this lack of investment helps drive health inequalities which are holding back the northern economy and cost the UK billions of pounds each year in lost productivity.

The letter, seen by The Telegraph & Argus, says the North has more universities in the world top 250 than Italy, Spain and France combined as well as "exceptional hospitals and proven strengths in health innovation". It adds: "There is huge potential to support economic growth through working with innovators to address the needs of patients, support the creation of jobs and drive inward investment. Our organisations are the anchor institutions in our cities and, with health innovation investment, we can help in levelling up the North."

It comes in a week that a landmark report by Professor Sir Michael Marmot warned that health inequalities were widening between the most and least deprived parts of the country, while a rise in life expectancy had "slowed dramatically" since 2010. Poor health accounts for one third of the productivity gap between the North and the rest of the UK, at a cost of £13.2bn a year, according to the Northern Health Science Alliance which brings together research intensive universities and NHS teaching trusts.

Funding more cutting-edge research in the North would benefit the region by bringing the latest health technology so it could benefit local patients first. And creating new jobs on the back of research work would boost the northern economy, ultimately leading to a healthier population.

Professor Paul Stewart, the Executive Dean of the Faculty of Medicine & Health at the University of Leeds, said experts in the city were already at the forefront of efforts to develop new health technology to benefit patients. But he said: "What saddens me even in Leeds is that I can go from watching a Test Match in Headingley two miles north of this university to Hunslet two miles south and there's a 10-year difference in life expectancy.

"So as we start to unpick those, my view is that we're probably going to need innovative technologies in order to try and overcome this."

A Department of Health and Social Care spokeswoman said: “We want to level up people’s opportunity to have a long and healthy life, whoever they are, wherever they live and whatever their background or social circumstances. That’s why our NHS Long Term Plan, backed by an extra £33.9 billion puts tackling inequalities at its heart."