Richard Edwards

In each Connections we ask someone from the alcohol and other drugs sector to share a little about their work and life. Let us introduce you to Professor Richard Edwards, newly appointed Head of Public Health of the College of Medicine & Public Health, Flinders University.

I'd originally planned to work... as a biologist. I loved biology at school I guess I had in mind becoming some sort of David Attenborough clone. I used to avidly watch his TV programs and he grew up in Leicestershire in the UK, where I was born and raised, but that was as far as any similarity went!

I'm really terrible at...  playing musical instruments. That is despite my best efforts. I love American blues music and there are stories of bluesmen like Robert Johnson selling their souls to the devil so they could play guitar. I would definitely consider doing that, but I fear I would still be rubbish even if I did.

I wish I’d never… watched the movie (and read the book) Jaws when I was about 10 years old. It definitely put me off swimming in the sea for many years, and I still look around a bit nervously when I am swimming even now. Coming to Australia has probably not helped with that issue.

I’ll never forget… when we came home from the hospital with our first daughter and my wife and I looked at each other suddenly feeling a bit overwhelmed with the responsibility and wondering what on earth do we do now with this beautiful but very fragile and vulnerable new person?

I can’t get enough of…. My wife’s Anzac biscuits.

If I had more time, I'd...  I would love to my turn some of my grand ideas for papers into actual manuscripts a little more often. You’ll have to take my word for it but I have written some fabulous ones in my head!

This weekend I will…  be entertaining two of our daughters and their partners and showing them around Adelaide. They are coming to visit us here for the first time since we moved from New Zealand in January. We are looking forward to going the fringe and the beaches and enjoying the sunny weather and warm sea (which coming from Wellington NZ is a huge change).

My goal for 2025 is... turn at least one of the papers in my head into reality. Also surviving the first year of the Trump Presidency seems quite salient at the moment.

For my next holiday…. somewhere off the beaten track in Australia. We haven’t really explored outside of the major cities, so really excited to investigating a whole new continent.

Career wise, I’m most proud of... my work in the ASPIRE Aotearoa Research Centre to support the introduction of world-leading tobacco control policies in Aotearoa New Zealand. Of course I played only a small part in that as it involved so many leaders, practitioners, advocates and researchers throughout New Zealand to get the legislation introduced and enacted. I acknowledge in particular Māori leadership underpinned the development of the Smokefree Aotearoa goal and action plan.  For a brief time it felt like we had in place genuinely ground-breaking and world-leading policies, such as taking the nicotine out of tobacco products so they were no longer addictive. These measures had the potential to dramatically, rapidly and equitably minimise smoking prevalence and were a possible blueprint that other countries could adapt to more or less eliminate tobacco smoking and the huge health impacts and inequities it causes. Unfortunately, it was snatched away in an election which brought about a change of government to one which seemed determined to dance to the tobacco industry’s tune and repealed all the key measures which was truly heart-breaking.

The qualities I most value in my colleagues are… strong social justice based values and the abilities (determination, drive, diligence and organisation etc) to successfully contribute to advancing public health goals. I have been fortunate to work with many such people throughout my career in public health.

The sector's biggest challenge going forward is… to achieve really big gains in public health and health equity usually requires implementation of effective population-based strategies and interventions and addressing the broader social determinants of health. The biggest barriers to that in my experience are political (e.g. ideologies and politicians opposed to public health approaches) and economic (e.g. industries like the alcohol and tobacco industries which oppose and block effective measures). Addressing and overcoming those barriers and building positive support for prioritising public health measures among decision-makers, media, public, communities etc are I think the biggest challenges we face.

My big hope for the drug and alcohol sector is… that effective and equitable public health strategies and measures are introduced in Australia to minimise the harm due to tobacco, alcohol and other drugs, and that they help inspire other countries to do the same.

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