A hive of activity: the future of public health

In consultation with primary and secondary care, public health has a crucial role in improving the health of the population through health promotion, advice on appropriateness and effectiveness of services and communicable disease control. The speciality of public health medicine can only achieve this goal if it is allowed a degree of stability after the numerous organisational changes of the last two decades. The ‘beehive model’ of public health may offer an organisational structure that is adaptable to further health service change, reflects the rise in multidisciplinary working, guarantees freedom of speech and is sustainable within existing manpower numbers.