Haringey OBE recipient, woman doctor, and public health activist, Bobbie Jacobsen’s memoir reflects on the biggest battles she’s faced and what we can learn for future pandemic prevention.

Bobbie Jacobson’s honest and deeply personal story brings home her passion for preventing ill-health. Not just for individuals, but for whole communities. It is a passion too often thwarted by governments, commercial interests and imposed on an obedient health management system.

Her personal accounts of the triumphs, setbacks, comedies and tragedies of a bold woman doctor, partner and mother start deep in the gender wars of the 1970s. They move on to a future in public health and family life she never dreamt was possible.

She goes backstage to recount untold stories of what really happens in government, the NHS and local
communities. Drawing on her international activism and work on the public health front line in London’s East End, she uncovers new truths about how community-wide prevention needs to be seen as an equal to treatment..

She sheds new light on tackling the persistent health gap in a future pandemic. At a time when the Public Inquiry into Covid 19 is looking to prevent future tragedy, her prescient stories show what really can be achieved when public health teams work hand in glove with their local communities and authorities.

Bobbie Jacobson has had four decades of experience as a public health doctor and activist. She was the first international leader on smoking prevention for women. She was Director of Public Health in London’s East End in the 1990s, and Director of the London Health Observatory from 2001 to 2013. She has written widely in the scientific and popular media, including two best-selling books on prevention. She was awarded an OBE in 2005 and lives in London.

She explains: “My book shows that the Groundhog Day of neglected prevention can be overcome. But not without sustained commitment from government. It must curb vested interests and work with, rather than against, local public health teams, and their communities.

My book takes readers into a deep dive beyond the confines of infectious disease. It exposes the real battles fought to prevent some of the big killers of our time that have put communities into Covid’s firing line.

It brings home the vital message that if prevention is to be successful, it needs to support action beyond as well as inside the NHS.”

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RELEASE DATE: 28/03/2024 ISBN: 9781805142874 Price: £12.99