Children & Young People

The purpose of the Children and Young People Joint Strategic Needs Assessment (JSNA) section is to support the work of the Council’s Health and Wellbeing Board by summarising key local needs, and services, and providing a series of evidence-based priorities to improve the health of the local population of people aged 0-19. It acts as a useful reference to inform high quality and co-ordinated local commissioning and provision of services shaped to the needs of their users, as well as to inform the wider council and members of the public.

This section provides information on the underlying trends in the health outcomes and influencing factors specific to children and young people that are identified in the Public Health Outcomes Framework (PHOF). It sets out the key needs and issues of the local population of children and young people, and makes a series of evidence-based recommendations to improve their health and wellbeing, and to reduce inequalities, including those driven by deprivation. Central Bedfordshire’s overall score for deprivation (using the 2019 Index of Multiple Deprivation) relative to all other local authorities in England, puts it in the least deprived decile. Where possible, Central Bedfordshire is compared to local authorities of similar deprivation. These are: Bath and North East Somerset, Bracknell Forest, Buckinghamshire, Isles of Scilly, Kingston upon Thames, Oxfordshire, Richmond up Thames, Rutland, South Gloucestershire, Surrey, West Berkshire, Windsor and Maidenhead, Wokingham and York).¹

Timeliness of data

The data featured is for the last applicable full year (calendar, academic or business) prior to publication, unless otherwise stated. The detailed analysis was published in 2021, meaning the data is predominantly from 2019/20. For the latest available data, see the Dashboard, which was published in July 2026. In the Dashboard, Central Bedfordshire is compared to local authorities of similar deprivation based on the 2025 Index of Multiple Deprivation, which put it in the second least deprived decile. These are: Bexley, Bromley, Cambridgeshire, Cheshire East, Gloucestershire, Hampshire, Hertfordshire, Leicestershire, Merton, Sutton, Trafford, Wandsworth, West Sussex and Wiltshire).²

Finding the information you need

Executive summary

A high-level summary of the major data and policy trends associated with pregnancy, birth, the early development and school years of Central Bedfordshire’s children and young people. This includes:

• Snapshot slides summarising the key findings, impact of COVID-19 and priority actions.
  These can be saved as an image or downloaded as a Powerpoint pack

• Key findings featuring the most important health outcome measures and factors influencing the health and well-being of Central Bedfordshire’s children and young people and how they compare to national benchmarks and similar local authorities

• The impact of COVID-19 highlighting how the measures taken to reduce the spread of COVID-19 impacted on services and those who use them

• Priority actions that explain the requirements needed to bring about the changes identified to improve health outcomes for the Children and Young People

Detailed analysis

This section includes further analysis of the factors that impact on the health of children and young people and details the policies, services and actions developed to address them. This is by life stage:

• Healthy Pregnancy, which includes: smoking, obesity, mental health and teenage parents, as well as access to maternity care and infant mortality.

• Healthy Birth and Early Years, which examines breastfeeding, development to the age of 5, hospital admissions, adverse childhood experiences and preventable diseases.

• School-Aged Years. This covers excess weight, vaccinations, health-affecting risk-taking behaviours, as well as Mental health, LGBTQ+ and personal, social and health education.

• Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). This provides an in-depth analysis of the numbers of children receiving SEND services by age group, primary and secondary need as well as highlighting inequalities experienced by SEND pupils and local service provision.

• Vulnerabilities and Inequalities affecting the area’s children and young people.

Also look out for:

This includes both the direct impact of COVID-19 on key health-related indicators, and the indirect impact on wider determinants.

These are high level objectives that have previously been identified as priorities and that remain important to delivering better health outcomes for the children an young people of Central Bedfordshire.

These are more specific requirements that are needed to bring about the changes needed to improve health outcomes for the children and young people of Central Bedfordshire.

We welcome your feedback on what you find useful and what other information you think would help understanding this important subject. Please contact us on [email protected]

References

1. English Indices of Deprivation 2019. [online] Available at:
   https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/english-indices-of-deprivation-2019 [Accessed May December 2020].

2. English Indices of Deprivation 2025. [online] Available at:
   https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/english-indices-of-deprivation-2025 [Accessed May 2025].

For more on JSNA objectives see: