Environmental Public Health Practitioner

Job Description

Key Responsibilities:

• Liaise and collaborate with other UKHSA Groups and Directorates; relevant regulators and others to promote an effective environmental public health response service by providing advice on the protection of the public following acute and chronic chemicalincidents.
• Provide information to the public and stakeholders on environmental public health issues as appropriate.
• Plan and carry out, with support, complex scientific studies of high quality to formulate robust evidence-based advice for environmental public health.
• Contribute to externally funded contract work and core research activities including critical analysis of data; collation of results; and development of recommendations or advice.
• Undertake or review risk assessments for the protection of members of the public from environmental media such as contaminated land risk assessments.
• Review environmental permit applications; health impact or environmental impact assessments or planning applications and provide advice on threats to public health.
• Undertake statistical analysis of data and contribute to the environmental surveillance function of the UKHSA including surveillance of environmental insult and related diseases
• Keep under review and raise awareness of the risks to population health of chemical, radiological and other environmental threats.

Publication and Communication:

• Contribute to research papers for submission to peer reviewed journals.
• Participate in scientific meetings and conferences, presenting papers describing research activities. These may be at internal (UKHSA), national, European or international events.
• Disseminate information and knowledge gathered from participation at workshops, meetings, seminars and conferences to colleagues.

Training:

• Provide training on environmental public health issues for a range of stakeholders, in support of RCE (Wales) and UKHSA training courses, in particular:

1. Provide lectures on scheduled training courses.
2. Review any training materials and provide critical review to improve training outcomes.
3. Develop and train other UKHSA staff.

Health Protection:

• Provide written and verbal advice on protection of patients, the public and chemical users from environmental hazards and provide information to the public and others on environmental issues as appropriate.
• Participate in emergency response to incidents where UKHSA has a response role, in particular:Participate in UKHSAs response to chemical and environmental incidents as appropriate, in support of other specialist teams

Other:

• The above is only an outline of the tasks, responsibilities and outcomes required of the role. You will carry out any other duties as may reasonably be required by your line manager.
• The job description and person specification may be reviewed on an ongoing basis in accordance with the changing needs of the division and UKHSA.
• It should be noted that the work of the division is of a confidential nature and must not be communicated to other persons except where required for authorised purposes.

Professional Development:

• You should pursue a programme of continuous professional development in accordance with any relevant professional registration or statutory requirements, while maintaining appropriate awareness of service provider requirements.
• To participate in all mandatory training as required, i.e. fire safety, information governance and all other mandatory training.

Personal Specification:Essential Criteria:

• An honours degree or equivalent in a scientific subject, or significant experience of working at a similar level in specialist area
• Experience of research and development in a relevant scientific discipline
• Experience of analysis of scientific and technical data
• Experience of scientific research and development
• Confident in using Microsoft packages - Word, excel and access databases
• Ability to communicate effectively at all levels, formally, informally, orally and in writing to UKHSA staff, and representatives from Government Departments and other organisations. This may require presenting technically complicated information to non-technicalstaff and members of the public
• Ability to observe and question when gathering information, disregarding irrelevant and identifying key issues
• Technical competence in data analysis
• Ability to assess complex situations and interpret detailed documents that may include guidance and legislation
• Excellent organisational skills and ability to work unsupervised
• Ability to work well under pressure and to deadlines, and able to prioritise workloads
• Ability to think on feet
• Good Interpersonal skills - Able to work as part of a team or alone
• Ability to identify scientific issues and undertake comprehensive literature reviews
• An understanding of and commitment to equality of opportunity and good working relationships.

Desirable Criteria:

• Relevant post-graduate Masters degree in a scientific subject or equivalent experience
• Experience of communicating technical information to lay people
• Experience in relevant environment e.g Environmental hazards, public health
• Broad general knowledge of sciences, environmental public health.
• Ability to write evidence base scientific material

Benefit Package:

26 days annual leave allowance increasing to 32 days after a 10-year service

Learning and development tailored to your role

An environment with flexible working options

A culture encouraging inclusion and diversityA