New Massey college to tackle 'health crisis'

Massey University is to establish a College of Health that focuses on prevention rather than cure – an approach Vice-Chancellor Steve Maharey says is essential if New Zealand is to tackle the looming health crisis.

The college will lead New Zealand in bringing together specialists from fields ranging from food and nutrition, sport and exercise, rehabilitation, nursing, Maori and Pasifika health, public health, social work, health and safety; as well as those researching the social and economic factors that underpin health and wellbeing.

“New Zealand, like the rest of the world, is facing a rapidly approaching health crisis," Mr Maharey says. "We have an ageing population, a tight health budget and escalating costs of new technologies and pharmaceuticals. There is a growing realisation that medically based solutions will not, by themselves, provide an answer.

“Our experts will collaboratively focus on what keeps people well – how factors such as the right food, regular exercise, working and living conditions, and social wellbeing protect people from disease and illness. Our research and teaching will look at the measures that enable people to live healthy, productive and independent lives.

“We have an over-stretched health workforce and growing inequalities that affect people’s health, and this impacts directly on health provision. New Zealand can't afford the health we all aspire to if we carry on as we are."

Deputy Vice-Chancellor and Assistant Vice-Chancellor (Mäori and Pasifika) Professor Sir Mason Durie, who led the establishment of the college, says the potential for preventing illness has never been greater, but as a nation New Zealand has not taken full advantage of what we already know about prevention. 

“We need to transform our thinking," Sir Mason says. "We can’t afford to keep focusing on the treatment and management of illness, disease and injury when we know we can prevent many illnesses and accidents.  And we have the potential to learn much more about prevention through innovative research.”

It will also build on Massey’s international connections with the World Health Organisation, the World Bank and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco) to ensure that it is learning from – and contributing to – international best practice and research.

The college will be formally established for the 2013 academic year.

Background:

Existing schools and institutes within other colleges will move to form the new college. These include food science and technology, human nutrition and physiology, sport and exercise science, health sciences and environmental health, Maori and indigenous health, public health, occupational health and safety, nursing, medical laboratory science, social work and social policy, health disability and rehabilitation.

It will also draw from health psychology, clinical psychology, infectious diseases, disaster research, speech and language therapy, music therapy and human development.

The college will have approximately 2000 equivalent full-time students and 250 staff.

Massey University has five colleges – Business, Creative Arts, Education, Humanities and Social Sciences, and Sciences. However, from next year the College of Education is to become an institute within the College of Humanities and Social Sciences.