New Chair of RSPH announced

Phillip Woodward has succeeded Dr Fiona Sim OBE as Chair of the Royal Society for Public Health (RSPH).

Related Article: New digital support for community nurses in 10-year plan

The change in leadership was announced in at the society’s recent AGM where RSPH celebrated its 160th anniversary.

Phillip Woodward is a qualified environmental health practitioner, and is currently an advisor on public health research and evaluation to the School for Public Health Research at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

He is a former local authority Chief Executive and Director of Environmental Services. In recent years he has worked as local government advisor to NICE, chairing its Local Government Reference Group.

Related Article: Nurse had to ‘freeze’ PPE during pandemic to re-use in care home, Covid inquiry hears

He has spent his career with local authorities across the country managing public services in the community and delivering practical solutions to address health inequalities and the underlying determinants of health and wellbeing.

Dr Fiona Sim is former Chair of RSPH and joint Editor of the international peer reviewed journal Public Health. Some of the campaigns she led as RSPH chair included promoting smokefree communities and calorie labelling on alcohol.

Related Article: Tell us what practice nursing means to you and potentially win £1,000

It was also announced that Heather Hartwell and James Gibson would be stepping down from RSPH’s Council.