Background: Tackling climate change, together with improving indoor air quality, offers a significant opportunity to improve residents' health and well-being. This requires the evidence base to inform an energy-efficient retrofit design.
Objectives: (i) To develop a protocol that could be implemented by local authorities across a range of housing typologies and (ii) to deploy this protocol to establish baseline conditions in n = 30 homes ahead of energy-efficient retrofitting.
Methods: Working with the local council and the community, this baseline study (In2Air) developed and deployed a protocol across 30 single-storey one- and two-bedroom properties owned by Newcastle City Council, United Kingdom, and occupied by tenants (> 55 years). The following data were collected before homes underwent a fabric-first intervention: indoor and outdoor air quality (for ~3 weeks); energy consumption (for ~12 months); occupant behaviour and home-specific details; self-reported general health and well-being.
Results: The collected baseline data indicated that the mean PM2.5 (particulate matter < 2.5 µm in diameter) concentrations ranged from 3 to 24 µg/m3 (excluding three homes where smoking occurred indoors). No homes had monitoring period means above the current United Kingdom (2019) outdoor annual mean limit (25 µg/m3); however, 21 homes had monitoring period means above the current World Health Organization (2021) annual mean guidance value (5 µg/m3). Strong correlations were observed between indoor PM2.5 and indoor PM10 (particulate matter < 10 µm in diameter), suggesting similar sources, while no-to-weak correlations were observed between indoor carbon dioxide and indoor PM2.5. Moderate-to-good ventilation was suggested by indoor concentrations of carbon dioxide across all the study homes. The lack of correlation between carbon dioxide and particulate matter highlights the need for housing professionals to add particulate matter to their usual indoor air quality assessment suite of carbon dioxide, temperature and humidity. Most homes had mean humidity levels within the range considered healthy (i.e. between 40% and 60%), with only three homes above this range. With respect to the baseline health and well-being scores, compared to the comparison population, data for this initial time point indicated most participants (83%) had a physical health score below the norm, which likely reflects the age (> 55 years) of the cohort. In comparison, the mental health score for most participants (74%) was at or above average. Here, the physical layout of the estate with communal amenities may well be engendering a positive sense of belonging. The mean/median ICEpop CAPability score suggests a high level of capability across the cohort.
Limitations: Our study focused on changes
Background: Gambling is associated with serious social and health harms, including suicidal ideation and suicide attempts. The risk of these adverse effects increases with consumption and imposes a substantial economic burden to the National Health Service and wider society, beyond the negative impacts on individuals and their families. Sports betting is a major growth area for the gambling industry. Sports bettors are disproportionately male and younger, two risk factors for gambling harms. It is important to develop and implement preventative interventions that limit the escalation of gambling harms among this group. We report on the feasibility of an intervention delivered within and by professional football clubs, a setting which has proved highly successful in attracting men to other behaviour change interventions (e.g. weight loss).
Methods: In what was originally designed as a three-phase study, a face-to-face group-based intervention (Football Fans and Betting) was refined in Phase 1, for delivery by trained community coaches at professional football club stadia. Eight 90-minute weekly sessions included interactive 'classroom-based' education around gambling behaviours, the industry and impacts, and group-based physical activity to promote social connectivity. Phase 2 assessed the feasibility of approaches to recruitment and retention and the acceptability of Football Fans and Betting to both coaches and participants. Phase 3 was intended to comprise a pragmatic, two-arm pilot randomised controlled trial of the Football Fans and Betting intervention at four professional football clubs in England.
Results: Data collected from participants and coaches via one-to-one interviews, observations and focus groups revealed significant barriers to recruitment, despite considerable iterative efforts to optimise 'branding' and strategies. Many of our target population did not perceive themselves as needing support. Instead, Football Fans and Betting was attractive to those with more severe gambling symptomology but who were ineligible as they required more specialist safeguarding support than Football Fans and Betting offered. It proved problematic to promote Football Fans and Betting as a programme to prevent progression to more serious gambling harms to men who were embedded in social networks where gambling was perceived as normal. The irony that many professional football clubs partner with gambling companies was noted by participants and some expressed scepticism around club intentions for delivering Football Fans and Betting. Despite considerable efforts to run Football Fans and Betting at six English professional football clubs during 2022 and 2023, insufficient numbers were recruited and retained. Phase 3 did not take place as progression to a pilot trial was unviable. Despite low numbers participating in Football Fans and Betting, those who undertook the programme found

