Ana Apatu: Smokefree meeting healthy start

Ana Apatu.

This past week we held our first auahi kore Paharakeke smokefree Flaxmere planning meeting. This has much potential.

Targeting retailers, increasing visibility of cessation services, prioritising hapu/pregnant Maori women (nearly half of Maori women smoke during pregnancy) are some of our priority areas. Those around me have been cutting back their smoking. All good things for our vision set by Pam - to improve the wellbeing of whanau of Flaxmere.

However, I need to discuss housing. It is impossible to work in Flaxmere and not be confronted by accommodation issues.

There are ongoing problems of housing security, difficulties and stress when trying to access a Housing New Zealand house, deterioration of the condition of some houses, tenants too disempowered to ask for help or ask for their bond back to be able to transfer to another more suitable house, families with poor credit rating due to poor choices with agencies that prey on vulnerable families, and people who have English as a second language with no advocacy or support when needed, substandard homes that are not insulated and rents that leave families struggling.

When speaking to any health worker in Flaxmere, whether it be Plunket wellchild nurses, primary care nurses, Maori providers or community health workers, the stories are all too familiar. Families need treatment when their health deteriorated as a result of living in cold, damp, overcrowded, substandard houses.

The Hawke's Bay District Health Board's Child Health team clearly describe the impact on the health status of families, particularly the elderly and the children: "You can draw a line in Flaxmere where the poor housing starts and where the children get sick".

There is compelling evidence that demonstrates when we insulate homes, people's health and work productivity is improved. The guru of housing research in New Zealand is Dr Phillippa Chapman, Otago University Wellington. I had first-hand experience with the university's first housing study. Employed by Ngati Toa's health arm Ora Toa, patients were selected from our general practice to take part in this housing study. In a nutshell, if your house is insulated there is clear evidence that you will have less visits to the doctor, less visits to the emergency department and less days off work. The positive effect on families when a house is insulated is immediate.

Because of the causal link between housing and health often health agencies fund insulation schemes. Although our health agencies have no direct funding to insulate homes, Health Hawke's Bay Primary Health Organisation and Hawke's Bay District Health Board fund healthy homes within a certain criteria .There is also a curtain bank co-ordinated by Red Cross. Many of our homes are well below the recommended World Health Organisation temperature of 16C. A heating device may be an oven with the door open. With the cost of power many elderly opt to live on tea and toast so they have a bit more money to heat their house. The other problem we have is unflued gas heaters. This form of heating is well known to most of us. Although quick to heat an area, the gases these heaters emit are harmful, not to mention the amount of moisture produced. I believe we are the only developed country that has not banned this form of heating.

We hear politicians discussing the need to have a housing warrant of fitness: A checklist that ensures houses are up to a certain standard, eg insulation, a heating device, hot water temperature at an appropriate level and smoke alarms. Housing New Zealand homes are now all insulated. The problem lies with private landlords.

We clearly cannot leave this up to the goodwill of the landlords of private rentals. Even with insulation schemes that offer subsidised insulation, this in many cases is not taken up. So for those of you that own homes in Flaxmere - do the right thing, particularly for the wellbeing of the children. They are our future.

• Ana Apatu is chief executive of the U-Turn Trust, based at Te Aranga Marae in Flaxmere.