Plymouth works towards its three key oral health priorities

The taskforce was created in 2023 in response to the city’s growing dental crisis, which has seen over 22,000 Plymouth residents join the waiting list for an NHS dentist.

The cross-party group includes representatives from Plymouth City Council, NHS Devon, Peninsula Dental Social Enterprise (PDSE), Livewell Southwest and University Hospitals Plymouth NHS Trust as well as the city’s three MPs.

The taskforce has agreed to focus on three key priorities:

Since June 2023, the task force has been working to deliver improvements, such as a new scheme by PDSE to provide NHS dental appointments to primary school children. It will now focus on campaigning for and delivering these three priorities.

Mary Aspinall, a councillor and cabinet member for health and adult social care and chair of the taskforce, said, “There is still a huge amount of work to be done in Plymouth, and so we will keep campaigning for better outcomes for our residents. At the moment, the situation is only getting worse. There are thousands of people still waiting for an NHS dentist and we believe this is just the tip of the iceberg because it doesn’t capture the number of people who don’t have an NHS dentist but haven’t joined the waiting list, or who have simply given up and had to pay private dental fees.