Thrive Plymouth was launched in November 2014. Its aim was to tackle the early development of chronic diseases and the shorter life expectancy of some groups across the population. It was evident that certain factors such as obesity, unhealthy diets, alcohol, a lack of physical activity and tobacco use was associated with the chronic diseases and so Thrive Plymouth was launched to tackle these; and most importantly the situations and circumstances that tend to lead to more harm linked to these behaviours in certain groups of the population.
Thrive Plymouth is a social movement, which has varying definitions along the lines of;
a loosely organized but sustained campaign in support of a social goal, typically either the implementation or the prevention of a change in society’s structure or values. Although social movements differ in size, they are all essentially collective. That is, they result from the more or less spontaneous coming together of people whose relationships are not defined by rules and procedures but who merely share a common outlook on society
Our many partners do not work with us because of contracts or legal requirements or money changing hands; they do so because the goal of supporting people – all people – to have healthier, happier and longer lives is one that we share.
Throughout Thrive Plymouth, we have built up a wide supportive network of collaborators who have joined the movement and have remained with us. We have previously described Thrive Plymouth as setting the destination and the route for a long voyage. We are all on the voyage together, but just in the way that you might expect a submarine to have differences to a sailing boat in how the journey is undertaken, we each use our own unique skills and experiences to guide our own journey. Our annual campaigns serve to add more partners to the journey, joining all the rest to widen the spread and the influence.
Thrive Plymouth is not a public campaign. Public campaigns have a tendency to widen - or at least continue - existing inequalities. Those who are most likely to hear, understand and take action on campaigns around their health are those who are already likely to be aware of the steps they can take to support their own health and acting on them. One of the points of Thrive Plymouth is recognising that we need to be there for those people who need us, which means working together as partners so that someone who is in contact with a person who might benefit from an intervention can signpost them to it.