Coventry smokers and drinkers targeted by health chief

[dutchman]

Around a quarter of people in Coventry still smoke and half the population drink too much, the city's director of public health has said.

The responsibility for public health is moving from NHS Coventry to the city council from April next year.

Dr Jane Moore expects to have a similar budget of £14m to help improve health.

As well as tackling smoking and drinking, Dr Moore says she will look at "broader determinants of health like transport, education and jobs".

Dr Moore said: "People need to recognise this is not about us being big brother and saying you're terrible people because you drink.

"We recognise that if we're going to make a change we've got to work with people and there are key things we've got to do.

"One is about improving access for people when they want to make a change and we've done a lot of work particularly around smoking. In fact our level of smoking has decreased over the last four years.

"We've gone from 29% to 24%. We can do better and we need to do better because the national average is 21%."

Despite the remit of public health set to move under the control of the local authority next year, Dr Moore does not think her budget will be much different.

"The preliminary indication is somewhere around £14m.

"But a lot of what is delivered of public health is not delivered by public health and it doesn't sit within public health budgets.

"What we'll be looking to do is working with our partners to make the most effective use of our budgets."