When considering the provision of healthcare services, it is necessary to examine action at a local level and problems that local health service providers must face. This is essentially because it is within individual communities and neighbourhoods that most public healthcare interventions take place. Local intervention is also important in order to coordinate a more even pattern of healthcare provision across the regions. There are significant disparities between regions and inter-regions of the UK. Recent cuts to public services, welfare benefits, and public employment have severely affected those regions. This chapter will thus explore health inequalities and inequity of supply across the devolved administrations, regions, and sub-regions. It will then review policy to address health inequalities and consider to what extent the current public health service governance framework, and especially health service provision at the local level, can mitigate disparities in health outcomes. It includes a short section on the response to the Covid-19 pandemic in the regions. © 2020, IGI Global.
The place-based challenge