Latest news with #ChrisWhitty
BBC News
04-07-2025
- Health
- BBC News
Chief medical officer makes case for active travel at York conference
England's chief medical officer has said the case needs to be made for the health benefits of active travel, even though it "isn't always politically easy".Prof Sir Chris Whitty told the Active City York conference the smallest changes to help people walk or cycle could transform people's health for the he said the weight of science and data needed to be thrown behind active travel as the issue had become increasingly Chris called on authorities to encourage people to make an early start, saying: "If people don't have the opportunity to get into the habit when they're children it will be very difficult to do so after." Speaking at the conference hosted by City of York Council at the Barbican, Sir Chris said active travel could have the biggest impact on people in ill said people's perceptions about active travel including concerns over safety needed to be overcome."It's critical to think about the short distances and to build between the spaces that people care about," he said."That can be transformational, it's really important for people's physical and mental health." The two-day conference saw active travel professionals gather alongside politicians for speeches and panel them was Local Transport Minister Simon Lightwood, who said the government was moving on from divisive to the Local Democracy Reporting Service, he said support of measures to boost cycling and walking had been framed as a war on said: "When we ensure that travel is more accessible we see healthier and more cohesive communities."It's about fundamentally reimagining how cities and towns work and who they serve."He said mayors and council leaders had a "critical role" in delivering on local said the government was looking very carefully at how to tackle pavement parking, and said decisions on 20mph speed limits should be made comments came as regional mayors including York and North Yorkshire's David Skaith backed a commitment to create a nationwide walking, wheeling and cycling focusing on school runs will be prioritised as part of the wider project which aims to create more than 3,500 miles of safer routes across the Boardman, Active Travel England's national commissioner, said the body's £616m in government funding for the next four years would bring transport freedom and improve safety, including for children.
The Guardian
02-07-2025
- Health
- The Guardian
Chris Whitty says culture-war coverage of cycling could harm nation's health
Culture war-based coverage of cycling based on stereotypes of middle-aged men in Lycra could harm the nation's health because it shifts focus away from the people and communities who benefit from physical activity, Chris Whitty has said. Speaking a day before the launch of the NHS's 10-year-health plan, which is expected to focus heavily on prevention, Whitty, the chief medical officer for England, called for people to set aside media cliches and instead focus on 'data which nobody can dispute'. If active travel 'is seen as something which is simply the reserve of middle-aged, Lycra-clad people cycling possibly too fast around the park, that completely misses the point of actually where the huge health gains are', Whitty told a conference in York. He said: 'There are some areas where you can send a debate from a cultural war into a much more day-to-day one by actually saying, 'OK guys, but this is the maths,' and ensuring that you do so with facts which people find surprising. 'So for example, the culture wars will always try and paint the person who's in favour of active transport, and let's say cycling, as middle-class, entitled, speeding like a bad person. What they don't see is a woman in a wheelchair who actually benefits even more from the activity that we're talking about.' Being more active, Whitty noted, was 'one of the most impressive things you can do to preserve health of all forms, physical and mental'. He added that the best way for people to do this was to build it into their everyday life, for example by walking, cycling or wheeling for transport. 'The people who benefit most from any form of activity are people who are doing none,' Whitty said. 'And the next group who benefit most are the people who are doing a very small amount, who might do a bit more. 'The second group of people who benefit most are those who are teetering on the brink of ill health, or are in ill health which could accelerate from under them. And for many of those people, a small amount of activity is going to be very hard work, but it is going to be remarkably powerful at preventing and in many cases, reversing the health conditions they have.' Transport planners should not just focus on bigger projects such as bike lanes, but also on everyday issues such as uneven pavements, which might put off someone with mobility issues from walking a short distance, Whitty said. To get more people active, he said, 'what we've got to do is build between the places people care about: from their homes to their shops, to their place of worship, to the school and so on. We've got to think about that in a really serious way.' In a sign that politics has begun to move on from the culture war-infused transport discourse under Rishi Sunak's government, 12 of England's regional mayors, including two Conservatives and one from Reform UK, have signed up to a plan to create a 'national active travel network'. Speaking alongside Whitty, Simon Lightwood, the junior transport minister, said the Labour government took a different approach to Sunak: 'Gone are the days, I hope, of this poisonous rhetoric around the war on the motorist.'
The Guardian
01-07-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
Twelve of England's regional mayors back plan to create ‘national active travel network'
Twelve of England's regional mayors have signed up to an unprecedented plan to create a 'national active travel network', focusing initially on helping children to walk, cycle or scoot to school safely. The scheme, which involves all non-London regional mayors other than one from Reform UK, is intended to fit into wider efforts to devolve transport planning, working with Active Travel England (ATE) to implement schemes they think would help their area. It has the backing of Chris Whitty, the chief medical officer for England, who said the scheme has the potential to 'significantly improve' public health in the areas involved, covering 20 million people overall. The 12 mayors, nine of them Labour and two Conservative, plus Luke Campbell, the Reform UK mayor of Hull and East Yorkshire, have signed a joint pledge to 'work together to improve our streets for everyone, for the benefit of the health, wellbeing and connectedness of our communities'. The initial focus from this autumn will be on trips to and from school, with a pledge to create a combined 3,500 miles of routes safely linking schools to homes, town and city centres, and transport hubs. It will be based around interventions such as safer road crossings and blocking motor traffic outside schools at drop-off and pick-up times. The involvement of the two Conservative mayors, Ben Houchen of Tees Valley and Paul Bristow, who represents Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, underlines that the debate has moved on from the culture war-infused period under Rishi Sunak, whose government pushed back against safer walking and cycling in favour of a 'plan for drivers'. Campbell was the last mayor to sign up. His Reform colleague Andrea Jenkyns, the mayor of Greater Lincolnshire, is the only mayor not involved outside London, which already has hundreds of so-called school streets and similar projects. Chris Boardman, the former Olympic cyclist who heads ATE, said the focus on routes to schools followed focus group work which found that people are particularly amenable to messages about walking and cycling when it is about children being able to travel safely and independently. He said countries including Finland had travel cultures in which primary school-age children routinely make their own trips, adding: 'If you start with asking people, do you want that for your kids, you'll have a very, very strong, powerful and politically popular – yes. 'So if there are mayors and leaders who are not standing next to that, then they have to be accountable for their choice. 'I want to see fear of missing out. If we get to a point where x per cent of kids in an area have the freedom to walk or ride to school, I think we'll see parents in neighbouring streets and communities thinking, hang on, why can't we have that?' Whitty said: 'Increasing physical activity has health benefits across the life course. As part of this, we need to make walking and cycling more accessible, and safer, as well as access to green space easier and more equitable. 'This will help remove barriers to improving physical activity levels and could significantly improve the health of England's increasingly urban population.' The 12 mayors to have signed the pledge are: Tracy Brabin (Labour) of West Yorkshire. Paul Bristow (Tory) of Cambridgeshire and Peterborough. Andy Burnham (Labour) of Greater Manchester. Luke Campbell (Reform UK) of Hull and East Yorkshire. Oliver Coppard (Labour) of South Yorkshire. Helen Godwin (Labour), the West of England mayor. Ben Houchen (Tory) of Tees Valley. Kim McGuinness (Labour), the North East mayor. Richard Parker (Labour) of the West Midlands. Steve Rotheram (Labour), the Liverpool City Region mayor. David Skaith (Labour) of York and North Yorkshire. Claire Ward (Labour), mayor of the East Midlands. Sadiq Khan, the London mayor, signed the pledge in support.
Telegraph
30-06-2025
- Health
- Telegraph
Revealed: Chris Whitty behind Covid guidance that triggered care homes spread
Professor Sir Chris Whitty was responsible for government guidance that was believed to have triggered the spread of Covid into care homes, The Telegraph can disclose. The Chief Medical Officer has told the Covid Inquiry that he was 'not closely involved' in decisions behind a scheme to discharge thousands of hospital patients into care homes at the start of the pandemic. However, government emails obtained by The Telegraph show that Sir Chris's office signed off guidance for care homes in England, advising them that they could take patients from hospital who had not even been tested. Emails also reveal that Helen Whately, the former social care minister, warned colleagues that sending people with Covid into care homes 'surely materially increases' the risks to residents. However, she signed the guidance off anyway after officials said that one of Sir Chris's two deputies was 'content with the advice'. The care homes guidance, published on April 2 2020, is considered one of the worst mistakes of the pandemic, and has been branded 'irrational' by the High Court. Sir Chris and Ms Whately will face scrutiny over their part in the guidance during the Covid Inquiry, which opens its examination of care homes on Monday. The guidance said care homes could accept hospital patients with Covid, as well as take in hospital patients who had not been tested and look after them 'as normal' if they did not show symptoms of the virus. The advice meant that large numbers of untested hospital patients carried Covid directly into some of the most vulnerable communities in England, likely leading to deaths. According to official figures, nearly 18,500 care home residents in England died between March 14 and June 12 2020, accounting for around 40 per cent of deaths involving Covid during this period. Sir Chris appears to have realised the gravity of the mistake less than two weeks after the guidance was published, according to government WhatsApp messages leaked to this newspaper and published as part of the Lockdown Files. According to the messages, Sir Chris told Matt Hancock, the then health secretary, that there should be testing for 'all going into care homes, and segregation whilst awaiting [the] result'. He offered the advice as Whitehall officials were preparing an update to the care homes guidance, reversing some of the early errors. Mr Hancock rejected Sir Chris's advice. He ensured the revised guidance included a commitment to 'test and isolate all new residents coming from hospital', but he rejected a further suggestion to test those coming from the community, saying that 'it muddies the waters'. Mr Hancock has denied that this was a rejection, claiming instead that Sir Chris's advice could not be 'operationalised' owing to a lack of testing capacity. Now a cache of emails between government officials reveal that, weeks earlier, Sir Chris's office had allowed the dangerous guidance to be published. They were obtained by The Telegraph during a years-long battle under Freedom of Information laws. However, the Government is holding back dozens more – with no guarantee that the Covid Inquiry will make them public. The revelations have sparked outrage among relatives of residents who died. Cathy Gardner, whose father Michael Gibson died in a care home in Bicester in April 2020, said: 'Sir Chris needs to answer questions about whether the risk of asymptomatic transmission was given proper consideration early on in the pandemic.' Ms Gardner, who won a High Court case against the Government regarding policies surrounding the decision to discharge untested patients from hospital, added: 'Sir Chris held one of the most senior jobs at the time. He has to be accountable and show his working.' Sir Chris told the Covid Inquiry in 2023 that while he was 'not closely involved in the decisions in relation to the need to free up hospital beds by way of discharging patients to care homes', he was 'aware' of them – adding that 'as CMO I had and have overall responsibility across all areas covered by OCMO [the office of the chief medical officer]'. In a witness statement, he also said he thought the decision to 'free up hospital beds by way of discharging patients to care homes' was 'prudent' at the time it was made, and that he still continued to do so. His reasoning and his involvement in the guidance is likely to come under closer scrutiny in the coming weeks, as the Covid Inquiry examines the Government's decision-making around care homes. By the end of March 2020, the Government had already ordered hospitals to discharge patients in order to free up beds. On March 31 2020, Sir Chris also attended a meeting of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, where attendees looked at an NHS research paper examining the spread of Covid within hospitals. It suggested on its second page that patients without Covid symptoms could pass the disease on to others. 'A key additional risk is transmission of coronavirus from non-diagnosed Covid-19 positive patients or staff, i.e. those who are asymptomatic or pauci-symptomatic,' it said. Both of Sir Chris's deputies – Sir Jonathan Van-Tam and Dame Jenny Harries – were also present at the meeting, according to official records. In the days before and after, Whitehall officials were exchanging emails back and forth, as they finalised the Government's official advice to care homes taking patients from hospital. Sir Chris's office raised queries about whether the isolation periods and advice about personal protective equipment (PPE) tallied with other official documents. However, it still allowed the document to be published on April 2 2020, two days after that Sage meeting, allowing untested patients to move into care homes. During the same period, Ms Whately was warning officials that transferring hospital patients with Covid into care homes 'materially' increased the risk to those already there. Her concerns were set out in detail by her staff members, who were liaising with other government departments. She raised questions about the 'lack of consideration of testing for discharges' and the danger of Covid spreading from hospital patients to care home residents, even if PPE was used. Staff summarising her views said: 'Do we really want to be discharging patients with Covid into care homes unless it already has Covid cases? MSC [minister for social care] is concerned that a patient will take Covid into a care home, and even with PPE that surely materially increases the risks to others in the facility.' While there is no evidence in the emails that her concerns were relayed directly to the Chief Medical Officer's staff, Department for Health officials responding to these concerns reassured Ms Whately that the CMO's office was satisfied. They wrote: 'Due to capacity concerns, care homes may need to accept patients in these circumstances but we would expect care homes would do a risk assessment to ensure that appropriate isolation facilities are available. DCMO is content with this advice.' DCMO is a reference to one of Sir Chris's two deputies, believed to be Dame Jenny in this instance. Whitehall officials also noted that they had inserted some extra lines into the guidance document telling staff at care homes that accepted patients with Covid that they should 'immediately instigate full infection control measures to care for the residents with symptoms'. Sources close to Ms Whately said she signed it off after being advised that care homes could manage the risks. Mr Hancock agreed to sign off the guidance on the basis that Ms Whately was satisfied. A Department for Health and Social Care spokesman said that Dame Jenny and Sir Chris would 'continue to support the Covid Inquiry' and that it would be 'inappropriate to pre-judge' its findings.
Daily Mirror
19-06-2025
- Health
- Daily Mirror
'Most important threat to health' will kill 30,000 people this year
Chris Whitty, Chief Medical Officer, has issued a warning Air pollution wreaks havoc on nearly every organ in the body, and it's expected to be linked to a staggering 30,000 deaths in the UK come 2025, a chilling report by leading medics warns. The Royal College of Physicians (RCP) has sounded the alarm that "no safe level" of air pollutants exists, highlighting the grim reality that roughly 99% of Brits are inhaling "toxic air". The startling insight reveals that exposure to this invisible killer could take off an average of 1.8 years from a person's life. Throwing fresh light on a decade's worth of evidence, the experts say that even seemingly benign low levels of pollution can adversely affect unborn babies and contribute to diseases ranging from cancer to mental health conditions and dementia. And there's more than just years lost. The toxic toll comes at a crippling economic cost too. Healthcare expenses and lost productivity due to foul air hit the exchequer for £27 billion each year, a number that could rocket to £50 billion if dementia and other broader effects are taken into account. Taking a stand, the College is pressing the Government for bold measures to clear the air, urging officials to put air pollution squarely on the radar as a critical health crisis. Lending his weight to the dire findings, England's Chief Medical Officer Sir Chris Whitty said in the report's foreword: "Air pollution remains the most important environmental threat to health, with impacts throughout the life course. 'It is an area of health where the UK has made substantial progress in the last three decades with concentrations of many of the main pollutants falling rapidly, but it remains a major cause of chronic ill health as well as premature mortality. Further progress in outdoor air pollution will occur if we decide to make it, but will not happen without practical and achievable changes to heating, transport and industry in particular. 'Air pollution affects everybody, and is everybody's business.' Dr Mumtaz Patel, president of the Royal College of Physicians, said: 'Air pollution can no longer be seen as just an environmental issue – it's a public health crisis. 'We are losing tens of thousands of lives every year to something that is mostly preventable and the financial cost is a price we simply cannot afford to keep paying. 'We wouldn't accept 30,000 preventable deaths from any other cause. We need to treat clean air with the same seriousness we treat clean water or safe food. It is a basic human right – and a vital investment in our economic future.' It comes as Asthma and Lung UK called for tougher clean air laws. Air pollution has triggered potentially life-threatening asthma attacks and severe flare-ups of illness one in five people with lung conditions, according to a new poll by the charity. More than half of 8,000 UK patients with lung conditions said air pollution had left them feeling breathless, according to the survey. Charity chief executive Sarah Sleet has branded air pollution a "public health emergency". She added: "It is the biggest environmental threat to human health. For the millions living with asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), air pollution can be deadly, yet many people are unaware of the toll it has on the nation's health. 'Toxic air is a major driver of respiratory conditions and can cause lung cancer and trigger asthma attacks, as well as flare ups of lung conditions such as COPD, exacerbating symptoms such as breathlessness, wheezing and coughing. 'Despite the huge personal and financial costs of air pollution, the government has not yet shown the political will to tackle this crisis.' On Thursday over 100 doctors, nurses, patients and activists will meet at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children in London and walk to Downing Street to deliver a letter calling for Government to commit to 'ambitious' air quality targets. And one expert from Southampton warned that the nation could be walking into a 'microplastics-style crisis'. Dr Thom Daniels expressed his concerns, as he said: "While outdoor air pollution is widely recognised and understood, the dangers of indoor air pollution remain largely overlooked – and I worry we're sleepwalking into another microplastics-style crisis if we don't act now." Next month a cross-party group of MPs said they will reintroduce a bill, named after nine-year-old schoolgirl who died from an asthma attack linked to air pollution, which aims to make clean air a human right under UK law. Dubbed 'Ella's Law', the proposed legislation is named after Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah, who lived 82ft from the busy South Circular Road in Lewisham and suffered the fatal asthma attack in February 2013. She became the first person to have air pollution listed as a cause of death following a landmark inquest in 2020. A Government spokesperson said: 'Air pollution is a public health issue, and we are committed to tackling this issue across the country. 'We have already provided £575 million to support local authorities to improve air quality and are developing a series of interventions to reduce emissions so that everyone's exposure to air pollution is reduced.'
