Local Authorities
Health and Wellbeing Boards (HWB) acquired their statutory responsibility for public health in 2013. There are four Local Authorities across the Hampshire & IOW geography with public health teams that can locally commission services from community pharmacy and they are:
- Southampton City Council - Health (southampton.gov.uk)
- Hampshire County Council - Public Health in Hampshire | Health and social care | Hampshire County Council (hants.gov.uk)
- Isle of Wight Council - Public health (iow.gov.uk)
- Portsmouth City Council - Health - Portsmouth City Council
Each has a Director of Public Health, a statutory member of the HWB who leads the strategic direction for public health locally. From January 2017, Portsmouth and Southampton will share a jointly appointed DPH while Hampshire and the Island continue with their own Directors
Each Council will procure services from a variety of providers that meet the needs of their local populations. As these services are locally commissioned there may be variation in the specification of services that that set out to achieve the same or similar outcomes and the obligations placed on providers will differ accordingly.
It is important that community pharmacy providers are familiar with the relevant services and their specifications and are familiar with the obligations they will be entering into as a provider should they so choose.
The Committee will seek to provide guidance and advice to contractors on each service locally commissioned and will seek to work with each Health and Wellbeing Board to ensure that community pharmacy can play its vital role in the provision of public health services.
Below is locality specific other information that has been issued by each respective authority: