Prevention is essential to improving health - Blog by Lainy Bedingfield

Lainy is the Managing Director @ Kingsway Community Connections, Glasgow

Prevention is widely recognised as essential to improving health and social outcomes. However, there is a contradiction at the heart of how it is supported. We say prevention matters, yet the systems designed to fund and sustain it are built on short term cycles, uncertainty and delay.

The work that supports prevention depends on consistency, stability and long term commitment. When these conditions are not in place, the impact is immediate. At Kingsway Community Connections, we have experienced periods of uncertainty where funding decisions were delayed or reduced. During these times, difficult decisions had to be made, including issuing redundancy notices to staff in the absence of confirmed funding.

This uncertainty was not contained within the organisation. It was felt across the community. People continued to show up. Relationships held. Trust, for the most part, remained. But the nature of conversations changed. People began asking what would happen if the centre was no longer there? Where they would go? What support would still be available? For some, this was about access to practical support such as food vouchers or welfare advice. For others, it was about something less visible but equally important. The centre was described as a place of connection. A place where people felt known. A place where relationships had been built over time. As uncertainty increased, some began asking where else they could go. That question matters. Because prevention does not sit within a single service. It is created through the interaction of relationships, support and stability over time.

When prevention is not sustained, these conditions do not weaken in isolation. They unravel together. Access becomes uncertain. Relationships are disrupted. Stability begins to erode. The impact is not delayed. It is immediate and felt by those who rely on these conditions to remain well. When preventative environments are weakened, the likelihood of crisis increases. Without consistent early support, issues do not disappear. They escalate.

This is not a theoretical risk. It is a predictable outcome. If prevention is to be effective, it must be sustained. Not in principle, but in practice. This requires funding structures and system design that prioritise consistency over short term cycles of uncertainty. Without this, prevention is placed on unstable ground.

If community-led work is to be understood as essential infrastructure, then it must be supported and sustained as such. And when it is not, people are left asking where they can turn. That is not a failure of individuals or communities.

It reflects how the system is currently designed. And it is something we have the opportunity, and responsibility, to change.