Healthy Ireland Survey launched to assess health of the nation

The seventh annual Healthy Ireland Survey was launched Today (Tuesday) in a bid to gain an up-to-date picture of the health of the nation.

The survey will see around 7,400 people, aged 15 and older, living in Ireland interviewed between October 2020 and June 2021.

The survey aims to give an up-to-date picture of the health of the nation and reports on many lifestyle behaviours, such as smoking, alcohol consumption, diet, mental health and health services.

The Survey will be conducted by Ipsos MRBI, an independent market research and polling company, which has been commissioned by the Department of Health.

From Tuesday, the Department of Health and Ipsos MRBI will issue letters to randomly selected households across the nation, inviting them to take part in the Healthy Ireland Survey, 2020-2021.

The letters ask those selected to call the survey number and to complete a questionnaire by telephone.

Survey participants are asked about their views and behaviours regarding a wide range of health-related issues, such as smoking, alcohol consumption, diet and nutrition, the ways in which they use different health services and other topics relevant to health and our health services.

Minister of State for Public Health, Wellbeing & the National Drugs Strategy, Frank Feighan, said: “The Healthy Ireland Survey provides a valuable flow of up-to-date data and information about the health of the nation and I would urge anybody who is invited to take part in the survey to please do so.

“The participation of members of the public is particularly vital during this time of rapid change related to the Covid-19 pandemic.” The Healthy Ireland Survey is conducted as part of Healthy Ireland, the National Framework for action to improve health and wellbeing of people living in Ireland.

Five waves of the survey have been completed so far and have provided a comprehensive and up-to-date picture of the nation’s health.

The results of this wave of the survey will be published in 2021.

The research data will remain confidential at all times; data collection is conducted in full compliance with the GDPR and the 2018 Data Protection Act; it will not be possible to identify any individual or household from the published aggregate information, research data or anonymised dataset.