Damaging Tory cuts to obesity and cancer prevention budgets will cost £3.2bn to reverse, report warns

It will cost at least £3.2bn a year to reverse damaging Tory austerity cuts to health budgets for curbing childhood obesity and smoking rates, a major new report has warned.

A report by the Health Foundation think tank has criticised the government for “short sighted and irresponsible” cost cutting which has created more work for hospitals in the long run.

Public health budgets which underpin ill health prevention initiatives as well as addiction and sexual health services, have been cut by almost a quarter (23.5 per cent) between 2014/15 and 2019/20.

This amounts to a £700m-a-year real terms reduction in the funding council programmes to help people live healthy lives despite ministers' identifying this as one of the top three health priorities.

The cuts have been disproportionately heavy in the most deprived areas, the report warns and this reduction is inevitably heaping pressure on already stretched NHS services.

Public health prevention initiatives are the only way to curb obesity and Type 2 diabetes epidemics – which the health service spends 10 per cent of its budget treating.

“At a time of ongoing wider cuts to public services that directly impact on people’s health, and with the NHS under intense pressure, the cuts to the public health grant are short sighted and irresponsible,” Health Foundation director of health Jo Bibby said.

“The long term consequences of eroding people’s health are likely to prove far more costly than the short term savings made.”

Its report warns that at least an additional £1.3bn will be needed to reverse the lost services in more deprived areas, with the remainder required to address the growing demand for preventative health services

The report comes after doctors warned life expectancy improvements in the UK issues serious warnings over child health in England and Wales caused by austerity.

Responding to the report, Labour’s shadow health secretary Jonathan Ashworth said: “When health inequalities are widening, improvements in life expectancy are stalling and infant mortality is tragically rising, a new approach to prevention and public health is clearly more urgent than ever.

“That’s why in the Commons on Tuesday I demanded ministers start by reversing these swingeing cuts to public health provision in next week’s Budget."

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said that the health secretary Matt Hancock would soon outline his "prevention vision".

They added: “We have a strong track record on public health – robust Government action has led to a fall in rates of smoking, and our world leading childhood obesity plan promotes ways to keep children healthy from an early age.

“Prevention is a top priority and we believe there is always more to be done – which is exactly why we are giving £16 billion to local councils to fund public health services over the current spending period, and we will soon publish our prevention vision.”