The body that provides a wide range of health promotion and protection services in the Auckland region is to restructure and cut staff as it prepares to lose 7% of its funding.
The Auckland Regional Public Health Service, New Zealand's largest public health provider, says it will lose up to 12 fulltime staff and refocus its efforts amid general belt-tightening in the health sector.
The service covers 1.4 million people and was the first to encounter swine flu when the virus entered New Zealand in April last year.
Fulltime staff numbers will fall to 158, and offices in Henderson and Manukau will close.
Family violence reduction and oral health promotion are to be dropped as the focus switches towards managing emergencies, cutting high rates of rheumatic fever and programmes to reduce alcohol and tobacco use.
The service's clinical director, Julia Peters, says some new jobs will also be created.
