Greater Manchester Health Protection Unit

The HPU provides specialist health protection advice as well as operational support on all health protection matters to NHS trusts, local authorities, community health services (including schools and social services), and the general public. The local authority and Primary Care Trust (PCT) areas served by the Unit are listed on our "areas covered" page.

Greater Manchester Health Protection Unit (HPU) is part of the LRS Division of HPA North West, and covers the area of the Greater Manchester Strategic Health Authority (SHA).

We are working closely with our partner organisations, including local authorities, microbiology laboratories, the Environment Agency and others, to develop the service across the conurbation.
The Unit comprises Consultants in Communicable Disease Control, Nurse Consultants, Health Protection Specialists, the County Health Emergency Planning Officer and administrative support. The Unit also has facilities for up to three trainees to gain experience in health protection, including Specialist Registrars, Associate Specialists, microbiologists and students in health protection related fields. Most staff are based at Peel House in Eccles, chosen because of its good access to all parts of Greater Manchester.

The primary remit is to work strategically to protect the health of Greater Manchester residents, to be a source of expert advice, and to assist PCTs in fulfilling their health protection responsibilities. Since we were established in June 2002 we have been developing the Unit to ensure a robust service for Greater Manchester. An immediate improvement to the service has been the ability to ensure 24-hour access to expert advice through the duty officer system, during office hours, and the Greater Manchester HPU out-of-hours on-call rota. Working as a team has also enabled individuals to specialise; for example, there are small groups working on blood-borne viruses and sexually transmitted infections, surveillance, tuberculosis, and training and policy development for the whole of Greater Manchester.

Last reviewed: 3 March 2008