A group of doctors and health experts have joined together this week to call for more action to address Māori health problems.
Adrian Te Patu: "When you line it all up, Māori live shorter, sicker lives than their non-Māori cousins." Photo: Twitter / @Te_Patu
Hundreds of people from the sector attended the Māori Public Health Symposium in Wellington yesterday to discuss ways to break down what they say are barriers to achieving that.
The symposium, organised by the Public Health Association, brought together Māori health specialists, doctors, researchers and providers.
Its aim was to come up with strategies to improve the wellbeing of tāngata whenua.
A prominent Māori health advocate, Adrian Te Patu, said figures showed Māori were struggling the most, which made it vital to have a unified approach.
He said the Government's current approach was not as effective as it could be.
"Government and their agenda at the moment is about personal responsibility. That kind of makes sense to people, but actually it makes sense to people who have control over their lives, and we're dealing predominantly with people who have less control over their lives," he said.
"So it's very easy to say you should take responsibility."
Mr Te Patu said the Government needed to take more heed of dire health statistics for Māori and act on them.
"People in this country know there are a disproportionately high number of Māori people living in a place of unwellness... When you line it all up, Māori live shorter, sicker lives than their non-Māori cousins," he said.
"We don't believe it's a big conspiracy; we are simply acknowledging it's a truism, it's a reality."
Climate change, economics also in mix
Hautahi Kingi, who is studying towards a doctorate in economics at Cornell University in New York, agreed on the need for change.
Mr Kingi warned the Government needed to be cognisant of a huge financial burden in the long-term if new strategies were not found.
"Māori and Pacific children in 20 years will be two of every five children in New Zealand," he said.
"There's just a bunch of demographic projections that say, given how many more Māori and Pacific people there's going to be in New Zealand in a few decades, we better sort out their health and economic outcomes now."
Rhys Jones, the co-convenor of the Climate and Health Council and a lecturer at the University of Auckland, said factors such as climate change and economics had a huge impact on Māori health, but that was rarely taken into account.
He said climate change needed to be viewed as something that affects not just the environment, but the health of tāngata whenua as well.
Dr Jones believed strategies such as reducing emissions and promoting walking and cycling instead of driving could help reduce diseases such as cancer, heart and lung disease.
He said discussing ways to achieve health outcomes was a crucial first step to finding better solutions.
"It's really important to have the discourse about Māori public health because of the huge inequalities that we have in Aotearoa. Māori have much poorer health outcomes than other New Zealanders."
