Public health budgets are set to be slashed by £200m this year under a raft of measures to ‘bring down public debt’, the Government has announced.
The announcement, made yesterday by Chancellor George Osborne,listed the cut in funding as Department of Health (DH) ‘non-NHS’ savings.
It means the £2.8bn originally earmarked for councils to spend on public health in 2015/16 will be cut by 7%.
A Treasury spokesperson told Pulse the £200m figure was based on projected local authority underspends and that the cut in funding would not affect frontline services.
Full story in Pulse 5 June 2015