The head of Scotland Yard has thrown her weight behind the idea that knife crime should be treated as a public health crisis rather than purely a crime.

Speaking to the London assembly, Cressida Dick argued that persistent levels of knife-related violence required a preventative program to help reduce the number of deaths and injuries from attacks.

Dick’s comments will be seen as a significant show of support from the UK’s most senior police officer for knife crime to be viewed through the “public health lens.”

Responding to a question on whether the Met was engaged in discussions about knife crime and public health, Dick said she was aware that most of those involved or prosecuted for knife crime had a troubled upbringing.

She said: “We are all committed to the notion that prevention is better than enforcement, which is, after all, the public health approach.

“[The majority of such offenders] are people who have suffered some kind of adverse experience of a significant sort when they are young and/or have limited or problematic family lives and parenting, all things that can lead to other negative outcomes and not just being subject to, or causing, serious violence to somebody.”

Her comments came only days before three fatal attacks on New Year’s Eve and a fourth on New Year’s Day, killings that pushed the total number of fatal stabbings last year in London to 80.

Sarah Jones, Labour MP for Croydon Central, and chair of the all-party parliamentary group on knife crime, said: “Any person of influence who suggests we start taking that approach is very welcome.

“I know that the government have a cross-departmental committee that meets to talk about violent crime, knife crime – the seeds are there. But this is something that goes beyond the Home Office, way beyond policing. It is a public health issue, it’s an epidemic.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Cressida Dick has backed a public health approach to knife crime. Photograph: Victoria Jones/PA

Treating knife crime as a health issue is credited with prompting a dramatic drop in stabbings in Scotland, with the decline most pronounced in Glasgow, a city that once had one of the highest murder rates in western Europe.

Dick said: “The public health approach is well evidenced in Scotland. There are very different communities, very different dynamics and very different issues around violence and, indeed, youth violence but, nevertheless, there have been massive reductions in violent crime through a primary health lens.”

Siân Berry, who represents the Green party in the London assembly and who has long campaigned for a public health approach to the issue, said it was the closest Dick had ventured to endorsing that approach.

“We have many international examples where they have cut youth violence by mainly investing in young people but the government in England doesn’t seem to be up for that yet,” she said.

Another option, said Berry, might be to invest a proportion of the police budget into youth services as a preventive measure to help offset funding cuts. “London will not be able to arrest itself out of this problem,” she said.

A recent crackdown in November and December, Operation Winter Nights, saw 900 people arrested along with the recovery of 359 weapons, including 278 knives. However, the latest data for London shows a sharp rise in knife crime with 13,715 incidents – a rise of 30.2% – during the 12 months to September.

Funding cuts have been cited as one reason for the increase, with Dick last Thursday stating that more resources would be put into tackling knife crime if extra money were available .

“We have taken thousands and thousands of knives off the streets. We are doing stop and search in an intelligent way, and we are stopping and searching those people we know are prolific knife carriers,” she told BBC radio.

But Jones said that targeting the issue at source was the most cost-effective method, stating that each murder ended up costing upwards of £1m in terms of police and criminal justice costs

The MP added: “There is considerable evidence that if you look at it as a public health issue, you tackle it at source; you have real intervention with the kids who are on the edges of involvement with criminal activity. Nobody from the prime minister down will disagree with that, the trouble is we are not doing it.”

The Home Office said: “Knife crime has devastating consequences on our communities and we are determined to tackle this head on, that’s why we are collaborating with a number of partners, including social services, schools, the police and the voluntary sector, as well as local councils, to address the root cause.”