Issue - meetings

To endorse the Bracknell Forest Health and Wellbeing Strategy.

RESOLVED that the Bracknell Forest Health and Wellbeing Strategy is endorsed.

To set out the results of the consultation, the amendments to the strategy in the light of the consultation and seek formal approval of the Health and Wellbeing Strategy.

Heema Shukla, Bracknell Forest Council (Public Health), and Andrew Hunter, Bracknell Forest Council (Place, Planning & Regeneration), presented the consultation on the results of the Health and Wellbeing Strategy.

The consultation took place in March 2022 and received 80 responses. 75% of respondents agreed with the strategy. It was felt that this was reflective of the work done with different groups to co-produce the strategy. The section relating to Covid has been re-written to reflect the changing focus of living with Covid rather than being in the midst of Covid. From the consultation, it was clear that there was a need to ensure that residents were aware of which services were the most appropriate to meet their needs.

In response to questions, the following points were noted:

·       Partners expressed concern in relation to the impact of long-Covid. Some residents were suffering from physical and emotional incapacitation despite being otherwise healthy, meaning that there was an additional cohort of people needing support who would not necessarily have accessed services before. It was anticipated that this could have a wider impact, for example, an increase in young people with caring responsibilities for their parents.

·       As a country there was still a lack of understanding as to the emerging long-term impact of Covid. However, long-Covid has now been defined and work has been going on nationally to estimate the proportion of people affected. In East Berkshire, Slough has started a pilot to understand local long-Covid numbers.

·       It was important to get the right support at the right time, and once patients have accessed clinical rehabilitation, they would need to move to community rehabilitation.

·       Residents have reported issues with clinical interventions being cancelled, significant delays in seeing a GP, and continued delays in accessing other health services such as Talking Therapies. There was an urgent need to tackle these problems.

RESOLVED to APPROVE the Bracknell Forest Health and Wellbeing Strategy 2022-2026.