Professor Fran Baum attended the National Rural Health Conference in Hobart this week to give a keynote address entitled: Governing for health and equity: perspectives for rural and remote Australia. Her address was covered extensively by Croakey.com  https://croakey.org/rural-health-advocates-urged-to-target-the-treasurer-beware-the-iceberg/.

She used the platform to address the need for more effective taxation in order to fund public good activity including education, housing and childcare. She shared the plenary session with Sir Harry Burns who has served as Director of Public Health for Greater Glasgow Health Board, and  Chief Medical Officer for Scotland. Professor Baum reports his speech was inspiring and he stressed his management style was to ask for forgiveness rather than permission and to ensure front-line workers were empowered to experiment.

Professor Richard Eccleston also spoke in the same session about the social determiants of health issues facing Tasmania.

Other speakers at the Conference include our former Dean of Medicine Professor Paul Worley now the National Rural Health Commissioner.

The conference had a strong focus on primary health care and the social determinants of health and was attended by over 1100 delegates. The tweet hashtag #ruralhealthconf contains the tweets which provide a comprehensive view of the presentations and discussions over the last days.