Forum writes to Chief Medical Officer

27/01/16 . News

The Men's Health Forum has followed up its call for the chief medical officer (CMO) to dedicate next year's annual report to men's health with some practical assistance.

In a letter to CMO Dame Sally Davies, Forum CEO Martin Tod welcomed this year's annual report The health of the 51%: Women for its gendered approach to health, for giving parity to mental and physical health and for seeing the need for wider societal engagement in improving health, especially in the workplace. 'We would strongly welcome a similar report on men and boys’ health next year,' Martin concluded.

Martin drew Dame Sally's attention to the 'similarly wide-ranging approach' in the Forum's Men’s Health Manifesto and to its recommendations to improve men’s health:

Highlighting the importance of tracking and reporting outcomes by gender
Increased investment in health research into men’s health issues, such as the excess burden of most common cancers amongst men
A strong continued focus on prevention
Removing the barriers to using health care, mental health and preventative care – especially for men (and women) in full-time work and self-employment
Not waiting for men to engage in areas where late presentation or underuse of services is an issue – especially mental health
Targeted programmes around the needs and attitudes of the highest risk men & boys
Building health awareness and literacy, especially amongst boys
Organisational focus on gender and inequalities across the whole health system

Martin wrote:

One area we were particularly pleased to see highlighted was obesity. As you know, in the UK, men are significantly more likely to be overweight than women (although less likely to know it) and slightly more likely to be obese. However, our recent survey of local authorities showed that, in authorities that record gendered figures, only 29,197 men received help from their local authority to lose weight, compared to 110,324 women. In addition, men are also only 24% of those receiving in-patient bariatric surgery. We strongly support action to address this – including a gendered approach to designing weight management programmes.

The letter reminded Dame Sally of the key role the Chief Medical Officer’s Report has played in men's health. The chapter on the topic in Sir Kenneth Calman’s report in 1992 helped put men's health on the map and led to the Men’s Health Forum being set up in the first place.

You can read Martin's letter in pdf.
Martin sent Dame Sally both the Forum's Men's Health Manifesto and its recent publication How to make weight loss services work for men.

The Men’s Health Forum need your support

It’s tough for men to ask for help but if you don’t ask when you need it, things generally only get worse. So we’re asking.

In the UK, one man in five dies before the age of 65. If we had health policies and services that better reflected the needs of the whole population, it might not be like that. But it is. Policies and services and indeed men have been like this for a long time and they don’t change overnight just because we want them to.

It’s true that the UK’s men don’t have it bad compared to some other groups. We’re not asking you to ‘feel sorry’ for men or put them first. We’re talking here about something more complicated, something that falls outside the traditional charity fund-raising model of ‘doing something for those less fortunate than ourselves’. That model raises money but it seldom changes much. We’re talking about changing the way we look at the world. There is nothing inevitable about premature male death. Services accessible to all, a population better informed. These would benefit everyone - rich and poor, young and old, male and female - and that’s what we’re campaigning for.

We’re not asking you to look at images of pity, we’re just asking you to look around at the society you live in, at the men you know and at the families with sons, fathers and grandads missing.

Here’s our fund-raising page - please chip in if you can.

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