THE standard of health in Thurrock has been dubbed “unacceptable”…by the councillor responsible for it.

Barbara Rice said Thurrock’s Annual Public Health Report showed a “robust strategy to help reduce the unacceptable health inequalities”.

The report including worrying facts including 22 per cent of Thurrock children live in poverty; 28 per cent of the adult population is obese and more than 22 per cent of children in year 6 are obese.

Thurrock Council took over responsibility for local public health in April, which Mrs Rice said gave the authority ‘a fantastic opportunity to put our efforts into improving the health of our communities.’ Mrs Rice said the important news in the full report was overshadowed by ‘silly errors’ in the short report given to full council last month and said residents mustn’t get caught up in the ‘hype and hysteria’ of what the report actually says.

Mrs Rice said: “Although some of these figures are concerning, now these areas of are within the council’s responsibility, we have an opportunity to put measures in place to address them.

“Twelve priorities were agreed unanimously at full council in October to begin the very difficult work of delivering more with less and helping more people to live healthier, illness-free lives for longer.

“That is what we must focus on. We know the problems and we’ve set out how we’re going to tackle them. Over the coming years we will be judged on how successful we’ve been.”