Category: Ministry of Health

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

As Kiwis prepare for Christmas, public health officials are recommending that people who are more likely to experience severe COVID-19, such as Māori and Pacific people aged 50 and over, as well as everyone aged 65 and older, get a booster vaccine before the holidays.

Dr Nicholas Jones Director of Public Health says New Zealand has been experiencing another wave of COVID-19 over the last few weeks with hospitalisations now back to levels seen last January. 

“We are concerned that as the country heads into the summer holiday period, there will be increased social gatherings and events which could both increase the rate of infections in the population and potentially put vulnerable populations at risk”, says Dr Jones.

“As we approach the summer season of gatherings and events, a summer 2023/24 booster dose of COVID-19 vaccine is recommended for groups who are at higher risk of becoming severely ill:

• people aged 65 and older,
• Māori and Pacific people aged 50 and older,
• those who have a medical condition that makes them severely immunocompromised (12 years of age and older),
• Pregnant people who have not had any booster dose previously, have co-morbidities, or have no history of previous COVID-19 infection,  
• residents of aged care facilities, and
• people who were recommended to receive a booster in April 2023 but have not yet done so.

“These groups are recommended to have a summer 2023/24 booster irrespective of the number of previous doses they’ve had, so long as they have completed the initial two doses and it’s been more than six months since their last booster or COVID-19 infection,” Dr Jones says. “If you get your booster now you will reduce your risk of severe illness over the holiday period.”

“Everyone aged over 30 continues to be eligible for a booster and people with complex health needs should also consider getting a booster, provided it has been at least 6 months since they had their last dose or had COVID-19.

“You can receive an additional COVID-19 booster dose, regardless of how many doses you had previously. You need to wait six months between doses, and it’s recommended that you wait six months after your last COVID-19 infection”, says Dr Jones.  

Chief Medical Officer for Te Aka Whai Ora | Māori Health Authority, Dr Rawiri McKree Jansen, says if whānau are unwell, they should stay away from friends and family at higher risk of getting very sick, such as pēpi, kaumātua, immunocompromised, and disabled people.

“It is also especially important to wear a face mask in closed, crowded or confined spaces, stay home if you feel sick and test for COVID-19, and if eligible, to take anti-viral medications as soon as you become ill with COVID-19”, says Dr McKree Jansen.

Dr Jones says free face masks and rapid antigen tests (RATs) are still available from participating pharmacies and RAT collection sites. “When picking up free masks from your local collection centre, talk to staff about whether a medical or a P2/N95 mask is the best choice for you.

“As COVID-19 continues to circulate in our communities, it’s important to keep up with good hygiene practices, hand washing, masking wearing, boosters and testing. People who test positive are still requested to isolate for at least 5 days and it is particularly important to stay away from those who are at risk of severe illness.”

Additional information

To find a full and comprehensive list of eligibility criteria for boosters and antivirals please visit the Unite Against COVID-19 website.

Boosters can be booked by visiting Book My Vaccine, visiting Healthpoint, or by contacting your local doctor, pharmacist or hauora provider.

Latest COVID-19 case numbers can be found on the Te Whatu Ora website.

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

Summary

In August 2023 the Director-General of Health recommended a time-limited pause on the use of surgical mesh for the treatment of female stress urinary incontinence (SUI). 

When the pause was announced it was recognised, based on international experience, that there would be a need for a high-vigilance guideline for non-mesh SUI procedures. The guideline would be used to mitigate and manage any risks while the pause is in place, and there may be a shift to non-mesh SUI procedures.

At the request of the Surgical Mesh Roundtable (SMRT), Manatū Hauora has led a cross-sector consultation on the development of the attached high vigilance guidelines. These guidelines have seen constructive and collaborative input from representatives of Māori Health Authority, Health New Zealand, Health Quality and Safety Commission, Health and Disability Commission, consumers, the surgical colleges (RACS and RANZCOG) and the NZ Private Surgical Hospitals Association.

It is the expectation of the SMRT that these guidelines should be implemented in all facilities where SUI procedures are undertaken.
 

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

The 2022 Health and Independence Report presents an overview of the state of public health in Aotearoa New Zealand for the 2022 calendar year. It does this by presenting data from a range of sources. It complements the Ministry`s Annual Report, which includes detailed information about the strategic direction of the health and disability system and measures of its performance and impact.

The report contains a range of information about the population, health measures, determinants of health, and the COVID-19 pandemic. It highlights the ongoing health inequities and how Māori, Pacific peoples, disabled people and socioeconomically disadvantaged groups generally experience worse health outcomes than other New Zealanders.

The 2022 report is divided into four sections:

• People of Aotearoa New Zealand – overview of population health measures and the health system reforms.
• Health measures – a range of information about the health of New Zealander’s, including topics such as health expectancy, mortality, mental wellbeing, chronic pain and diabetes.
• Determinants of health – the wider determinants that influence people’s mental and physical health. The topics covered range from child poverty and the housing environment to diet and health care service use.
• COVID-19 – an overview of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Health and Independence Report 2022 and Pae Ora Health Strategies were produced from a shared evidence base of health and non-health data.

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

Summary

The quantitative measures presented in this report are designed to provide a broad view of the current state of system performance against our four objectives, rather than to reflect progress on any individual action in Whakamaua. Achieving these objectives will make a significant contribution to realising the plan’s high-level outcomes for Māori health and wellbeing.

It will take time for the large system changes needed to occur to meet our four objectives, so the measures in this report do not yet reflect the system changes we are expecting as a result of the actions in Whakamaua. These measures were selected to provide our initial baseline because they are relevant, technically reliable, and because the data is already available in the health and disability system. This means we will be able to report on these measures regularly over the period of the plan, so changes can be measured over time and trends can be shown.

Objectives and measures

• Accelerate and spread the delivery of kaupapa Māori and whānau-centred services. 
  • 1.1 Funding received by kaupapa Māori health and disability service providers 
  • 1.2 Geographical coverage and utilisation of rongoā Māori services 
  • 1.3 The percentage of Māori reporting unmet need for primary health care 
• Shift cultural and social norms.
  • 2.1 Experience of health services as measured by the primary health care and adult inpatient patient experience surveys
  • 2.2 Missed appointments for Māori at outpatient services (first specialist appointments) at DHBs
  • 2.3 Percentage of Māori in the regulated workforce compared with the percentage of Māori in the population.
• Reduce health inequities and health loss for Māori.
  • 3.1 Rates of ambulatory sensitive hospitalisations (ASH) for Māori aged 0–4-years
  • 3.2 Māori young people able to access specialist mental health or addiction services in a timely manner (within three weeks from referral) 
  • 3.3 Rate of diabetes complications (ie limb amputations and renal failure).
• Strengthen system accountability settings
  • 4.1 Measures of the health of Māori/Crown partnerships
  • 4.2 Number of kaupapa Māori research proposals receiving ethics approval that focus on Māori health and disability
  • 4.3 Number of Māori in leadership and governance roles across the Ministry, DHBs and health sector Crown entities
  • 4.4 Standardised acute bed days per capita for Māori.

Changes in measures

The 2023 publication of the Whakamaua insights are disaggregated by Iwi-Māori Partnership Boards (IMPB) to show the regional distribution of health outcomes instead of Districts as previously published. This is the first-time health statistics have been published by IMPB, which also required the use of the Health Service Utilisation population as the denominator due to the new boundary definitions. 

A review of the measure of diabetes complications resulted in this measure changing from primary-diagnosis diabetes related hospitalisations only to primary and secondary-diagnosis diabetes related hospitalisations. The dashboard provides adjusted insights for previous years to enable consistent comparisons over time.

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

This report shows information on funding to Māori health providers by the Ministry of Health (the Ministry) and District Health Boards (DHBs) for the period 2017/18 to 2021/22. This report follows on from our reports in 2017, 2021 and 2022 on the same topic and is part of our monitoring of Whakamaua: Māori Health Action Plan 2020-2053.

Highlights include:

• funding to Māori health providers by the Ministry of Health and District Health Boards was $456.6 million in 2021/22, an increase of $149.6 million (or 48.7%) since 2017/18 (see Table 1)
   
• although funding to Māori health providers is increasing, it remains a small part of Vote Health, remaining near 2 percent between 2017/18 and 2021/22
   
• the Ministry has begun measuring Other types of funding not included in the figures above. These are: Māori Provider Development Scheme, Māori primary health organisations, Māori general practices, for Hauora Māori Scholarships, and payments for the delivery of COVID-19 services. These payments increased by $277.3 million between 2017/18 and 2021/22, or 331.8 percent. This is higher than the increase in Vote Health during the same time (30.4%)

Measuring Other types of funding is subject to large fluctuations particularly funding to Māori PHOs. The fluctuations are due to new PHOs being created, closures and amalgamation of PHOs; and general practices moving between PHOs. Because of this, Table 1 may be a more consistent way to measure changes in funding to Māori health providers.

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

This report provides information about disabled people who access a range of disability support services funded by the Ministry of Health. The information in this report relates to people who accessed disability support services in the financial year from 1 July 2019 to 30 June 2020 inclusive (2019/20). The report also presents five-year trends back to 2015/16, where applicable.

The disability support service types covered in this report include:

• Home and Community Support (HCSS)
• Carer Support (CS)
• Community Residential Support
• Choice in Community Living (CiCL)
• Younger people in aged residential care (YPD)
• Supported Living
• Respite
• Behaviour Support Services (BSS)
• Day services
• Services under the High and Complex Framework
• Individualised Funding (IF)
• Enhanced Individualised Funding (EIF)
• Funded Family Care (FFC)
• Community rehabilitation
• Enabling Good Lives (EGL)
• Equipment and Modification Services (EMS)
• Hearing services
• Vision services
• Assessment, Treatment & Rehabilitation (AT&R)

This report also breaks down the data by disability type, including physical, intellectual, autism, neurological and sensory disabilities.

Please note Disability Support Services were delivered by the Ministry of Health until 30 June 2022. From 1 July 2022, these services are delivered by Whaikaha – Ministry of Disabled People. For queries relating to this report, please contact [email protected].

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

The 2021 Health and Independence Report provides an overview of the state of public health in Aotearoa New Zealand for the 2021 calendar year. To do this it comprises a range of up-to-date information about the population, the COVID-19 pandemic, and an extensive range of health measures. The data presented comes from a range of sources, including the New Zealand Health Survey and the National Collections. The report complements the Ministry’s Annual Report, which includes detailed information about the strategic direction of the health and disability system and measures of its performance and impact.

The Report highlights that health equity continues to be a challenge. Māori, Pacific peoples, disabled people, and socioeconomically disadvantaged groups generally experience worse health outcomes than other New Zealanders.

The 2021 report is divided into three sections:

• People of Aotearoa – population overview and population health measures, such as life expectancy, health expectancy, morbidity and mortality, and factors contributing to health loss.
• Impacts of COVID-19 – an overview of the COVID-19 pandemic in Aotearoa, including the pandemic response, vaccination programme, testing and case demographics for the 2021 calendar year.
• Health Measures – a wide range of health measures for 2021, including maternity, primary care, barriers to heath care, child oral health, immunisation, the RSV outbreak, cancer, long term conditions and hospitalisation rates.

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

The Primary Health Organisation (PHO) enrolment of children in contact with the care and protection system presents an overview of the PHO enrolment status of children in New Zealand in 2021. This is a joint report between Oranga Tamariki and Manatū Hauora.

The report presents data on the overall PHO enrolment status of children grouped into cohorts based on their level of contact with Oranga Tamariki. We found that children in care have similar enrolment rates to children with no care and protection history (94% for children in care and 95% for children with no care and protection contact). It describes those groups further by:

• Māori indicator
• gender
• age.

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

In New Zealand as in many other countries radium has been used for various reasons such as its incorporation into luminous paint for watch dials and hands, alongside its implementation into medicines and therapeutic applications.

This information sheet provides an overview of radium in New Zealand, explains what radium is, its historic uses, associated health risks, and offers practical advice on identifying, storing, and handling radium devices safely.

Source: New Zealand Ministry of Health

Summary

This report provides an overview of the abortion services work of Manatū Hauora between October 2022 and September 2023.

The abortion statistics covering the 2022 calendar year provide additional insight into abortion services across Aotearoa. Areas of focus include meeting Te Tiriti o Waitangi obligations and improving equity and access.

Key achievements include increased accessibility through the growth of the abortion workforce and number of facilities providing local in-person abortion services. Endorsement of early medical abortion (EMA) training for midwives, and access to EMA through a national telehealth service – DECIDE, have also facilitated this increase in accessible service provision.

The implementation of 11 Safe Areas, accounting for about one-third of all current abortion service providers, have been established at the time of publication to protect the safety, wellbeing, privacy, and dignity of people who are accessing, or providing, abortion services.