School dinners indicator

Once again the numbers of children eligible for free school meals has increased, with over 18% of nursery and primary school aged children and 15% of secondary school aged children now eligible. An article in Children and Young People Now quotes a representative from the NUT who noted that this is in part a result of budgetary provision but that it also could reflect the effects of recession. With the Child Poverty Act 2010 setting a target of 2020 to end child poverty in the UK, these figures offer another challenge to the government. Consultation on statutory guidance for local authorities and others (including SHAs and PCTs) under the Act was published in March.

Age equality

DH has published the results of its consultation on the implications for health and social care of the 2010 Equality Act's measures on age, following a report that DH commissioned from Sir Ian Carruthers and Jan Ormondroyd.

Green thoughts

The latest issue of Health and Place include a review of qualitative research on physical activity in urban parks. As its authors suggest, this kind of data has been excluded from recent analysis, but may help to inform design or evaluation of interventions to increase physical exercise in an urban setting. Earlier this month, a team from the University of Essex published a meta-analysis of green exercise studies from the UK, looking for "the Best Dose of Nature and Green Exercise for Improving Mental Health." The study was widely reported in the press and is thus itself the subject of appraisal on the NHS Choices Behind the Headlines column.

Community spirit

The latest reports to come from the 2007-08 Citizenship Survey have been published. They cover community empowerment and volunteering and charitable giving. The empowerment report looks at whether people think they can influence decision making at a local and national level and how far they trust the decision makers, as well as levels of civic engagement.

Alcohol data

The latest Local Alcohol Profiles for England are available from the Northwest Public Health Observatory. Data is provided at PCT and Local Authority level. ERPHO's new dashboard presentation gathers together key online resources concerning alcohol for the eastern region.

Obesity update

NHS Evidence's Public Health specialist library offers its annual evidence update on childhood obesity, a very useful survey of contributions to the sum of knowledge on the subject over the past year. A study published in the International Journal of Epidemiology confirms the relationship between lower educational attainment and likelihood of being overweight or obese. Researchers looked at self-reports from national health surveys covering 19 countries in Europe. In the Journal of the American Medical Association, a study tests the impact of negative attitudes to obesity amongst clinicians and concerns about lack of respect amongst obese patients. The study, which looked at samples of patients from the Medicaid and VHA populations in the US, found no evidence of reduced quality of care and that "being obese or overweight was associated with a marginally higher rate of recommended care on several measures."

Slicing up the pie

Independent think tank Civitas launches a lively attack on how PCT funding has been calculated in order to tackle health inequalties.