31 August 2011

Primo workshop nazionale sulla VIS

L’incontro si e` tenuto a Roma il 28 settembre 2010 ed e` stato promosso da IFC-CNR, Anci, Coordinamento Agende 21 Locali Italiane e Consorzio Mario Negri Sud.


I partecipanti al workshop concordano che sebbene l’Italia sia ancora indietro rispetto ad alcuni altri paesi europei la sperimentazione è decisamente positiva. La Valutazione di impatto sulla salute (VIS) e` un processo che aiuta a ridurre i rischi per la popolazione ed al tempo stesso supporta gli enti locali e le varie amministrazioni nel loro lavoro di pianificazione e valutazione dei rischi.


Una nota riassuntiva sull’evento e` disponibile sul sito Eco dalle Città




La regione Emilia Romagna ha sviluppato un modello VIS specifico per gli impianti di incenerimento o combustione.

Il “Progetto Moniter: organizzazione di un sistema di sorveglianza ambientale e valutazione epidemiologica nelle aree circostanti gli impianti di incenerimento in Emilia-Romagna” e stato promosso e coordinato dagli Assessorati regionali Ambiente e Politiche per la salute per approfondire le conoscenze sulle emissioni degli inceneritori, analizzarne ricadute ed impatto sulla salute, maturare esperienze di valutazione di impatto sulla salute e migliorare la capacita di comunicazione e gestione dei conflitti ambientali.





Il progetto era articolato in sette linee progettuali (LP). Obiettivo della Linea Progettuale 6 (LP6) di Moniter, articolata in tre azioni, era l’elaborazione di un percorso di VIS applicabile alla pianificazione di impianti di incenerimento o combustione di futura realizzazione. Il lavoro della LP6 e partito da un’analisi della letteratura internazionale e nazionale sulla VIS, accompagnata dalla consultazione di esperti: sono state cosi identificate e raccolte in raccomandazioni le caratteristiche essenziali di un modello di VIS per gli impianti di interesse (Azione 1). Parte delle raccomandazioni ha riguardato gli aspetti di comunicazione e il coinvolgimento dei soggetti interessati alle decisioni, elementi cruciali dei percorsi di VIS (Azione 2). L’Azione 3, coinvolgendo operatori di ARPA e dei Dipartimenti di Sanita Pubblica.





Per ulteriori infromazioni consultare il sito del progetto:



http://www.arpa.emr.it/cms3/documenti/moniter/quaderni/02_VIS.pdf



30 August 2011

Linee guida sulla VIS per la Regione Abruzzo

La Regione Abruzzo ha sviluppato le linee guida per la Valutazione d’Impatto sulla Salute in ottemperanza alle leggi Regionali per la valutazione del rischio sanitario determinato da fonti di inquinamento ambientale.


Le line guida sono state prodotte in collbaorazione con l’Istituto Mario Negri Sud, l’Azienda Sanitaria Regionale (ASR) Abruzzo e finalmente l’Azienda Regional per la Tutela dell’Ambiente (ARTA) Abruzzo. Il documento si trova: http://www.negrisud.it/ambiente/lineeguidaVIS.pdf



La VIS in Abruzzo si inserisce nell’ambito di un approccio valutativo integrato tra ambiente e salute. La VIS verra infatti integrata con altri procedimenti gia presenti sul territorio come la VAS e VIA.



VAS: Valutazione Ambientale Strategica, introdotta dalla Direttiva 2001/42/CE del Parlamento europeo e del Consiglio del 27 giugno 2001. In Inglese SEA: Strategic Environmental Assessment



VIA: Valutazione di Impatto Ambientale. In Inglese EIA: Environmental Impact Assessment



Going Multilingual: Expanding our coverage of HIA

As some of you will have noticed this blog is now an activity of the International Association for Impact Assessment's Health Section. This recognises the professional contribution that a number of IAIA members have been making informally to this blog for more than six years.

As part of this transition we're extending the range of languages we publish in, to reflect the increasingly diverse nature of the global HIA community. We've already posted in Italian and French and we're hoping to have posts in Spanish and Thai up soon. Don't worry if you're only interested in the English posts though - we have a page for them too.

If you'd like to contribute in any language please let us know. We love your one-off submissions and would welcome new regular contributors.


Bulletin politiques publiques et santé pour août

Le Bulletin politiques publiques et santé est produit et réalisé par l'Institut national de santé publique du Québec:
Événements
EUR - Health impact assessment training
L’évaluation d’impact sur la santé (EIS) est un outil pratique qui peut nous permettre de comprendre comment les décisions prises dans un large éventail de domaines politiques peuvent avoir un impact sur la santé et les inégalités en santé. Dans le cadre de son programme de développement professionnel, Greater Manchester Public Health offre divers ateliers d'un jour sur l’évaluation d’impact sur la santé entre le 23 septembre 2011 et le 31 octobre 2011. L'inscription est gratuite et ouverte au personnel travaillant dans les domaines des soins de santé, des services sociaux et de santé publique, des enjeux socio-économiques, de l’environnement, du développement durable, du transport, de la planifica! tion, du logement.
EUR - Health impact assessment 3-day training course
L'Université de New South Wales à Sydney, en Australie, offre un cours d’introduction à l'évaluation d'impact sur la santé (ÉIS) du 5 au 7 octobre 2011. L’EIS est un processus structuré qui évalue les impacts des projets proposés, des programmes ou des politiques en étudiant les facteurs sociaux, environnementaux et économiques qui influent sur la santé humaine. La formation est pratique et interactive : le cours est limité à 24 participants pour un coût de 1200 $ par personne.
US - 2011 HIA of the Americas Workshop 
Cet atelier de deux jours organisé par des organisations américaines et canadiennes d’évaluation d’impact sur la santé (EIS) aura lieu les 17 et 18 octobre à Oakland, en Californie. Il comprendra des sessions sur l'utilisation et l'application des normes, les lignes directrices, la qualité des preuves et des méthodes analytiques; l’engagement des parties prenantes, l'intégration de l'EIS et d'autres processus de réglementation. Il abordera également de nouveaux sujets touchant l'EIS, y compris la santé mentale et l'emploi. L'atelier est destiné aux praticiens de l'ÉIS dans les Amériques.

29 August 2011

News on HIA from Italy: Participative assessment of the health, environmental and socio-economic impacts deriving from the handling of urban waste

The Italian Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR) together with other italian partners is implemtenting a project funded by the European Union (EU) to apply Health Impact Assessment (HIA) procedures into waste cycle management systems.


Integrating HIA with the Local Agenda 21(LA 21) will better enable citizens, particularly disadvantaged ones, to share in decision-making processes around the location, construction and operation of waste-handling plants, as well as waste reuse and recycling issues. The project will identify examples of existing waste treatment plants in Italy and apply a retrospective HIA – to be managed by LA 21 forums working in the area – at two different types of waste treatment plant.



Further information on the project: http://tinyurl.com/3rlw4zq



News sent by: Consorzio Mario Negri Sud



Notizie sulla VIS dall 'Italia: valutazione partecipativa degli impatti sulla salute, ambientali e socio-economici derivanti dal trattamento di rifiuti urbani.



Il Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR) insieme ad altre istituzioni italiane gestira` un progetto finanziato dall'Unione Europea (UE) per applicare le procedure della valutazione dell'impatto sulla salute (VIS) ai sistemi di gestione del ciclo dei rifiuti. L’integrazione della VIS con l'Agenda 21 locale (LA 21) meglio consentira` ai cittadini, in particolare quelli piu`svantaggiati, di condividere i processi decisionali riguardanti l’ubicazione, costruzione e gestione di impianti di gestione dei rifiuti, così come i problemi dei rifiuti e riciclaggio.



Ulteriori informazioni sul progetto: http://tinyurl.com/3rlw4zq



Notizie inviate da: Consorzio Mario Negri Sud



26 August 2011

UNDP UNEP Mainstreaming Climate Change into Development Planning


Efforts to mainstream climate change adaptation into national development planning are still at a relatively early stage in many countries. Countries are increasingly requesting the United Nations Development Programme–United Nations Environment Programme Poverty-Environment Initiative (PEI) to tackle the mainstreaming of climate change adaptation into their national development planning, as part of broader poverty-environment mainstreaming efforts.

The approach recommended in this guide builds on the overall poverty-environment mainstreaming framework presented in the publication Mainstreaming Poverty-Environment Linkages into Development Planning: A Handbook for Practitioners.

The framework proposed in this guide consists of three components, each of which involves a set of activities or modules for which a range of tactics, methodologies and tools can be used.

1. Finding the entry points and making the case is concerned with setting the stage for mainstreaming. This entails understanding the linkages between climate change and national development priorities, as well as understanding the governmental, institutional and political contexts and needs, in order to define pro-poor adaptation outcomes on which to focus. From this vantage point, the mainstreaming team can identify entry points into development planning and make the case for mainstreaming climate change adaptation.

2. Mainstreaming adaptation into policy processes focuses on integrating adaptation issues into an ongoing policy process, such as a national development plan or sector strategy. Such efforts are based on country-specific evidence, including impact, vulnerability and adaptation assessments, socio-economic analysis, and demonstration projects

3. Meeting the implementation challenge aims to ensure mainstreaming of climate change adaptation into budgeting and financing, implementation and monitoring, and the establishment of mainstreaming as standard practice.

Stakeholder engagement occurs throughout, from inception through policy development, implementation and monitoring.

Go to the UNDP-UNEP Publications page.

Download the guide by clicking here.

Hat Tip Loreley Fortuny, IAIA Connect

24 August 2011

The health impacts of people buying soda/soft drinks with food stamps?

The USDA recently rejected a proposal from New York City to ban the use of food stamps to purchase soda/soft drinks. Grist has much more on the decision. It made me wonder what would be the health impacts of such a proposal?

There seems to be an awful lot of paternalistic assumptions underpinning the proposal. Further I doubt it would have much of an impact at a population level. What are your thoughts?

Related: Bad Food? Tax It, and Subsidize Vegetables [New York Times]

22 August 2011

A new guide to effective risk communication, one of the “greatest challenges” in public health


From Croakey:
Risk communication is one of the greatest challenges facing any public health agency; done badly it can cost lives, money, and reputations.
That’s according to a new guide released by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and US Department of Health and Human Services, Communicating Risks and Benefits: An Evidence-Based User’s Guide.
Its 242-pages includes chapters on ‘best guesses’ at best practices, communications design, and advice on implementing evidence-based communication.
It distinguishes risk communication from public affairs/PR communication by its commitment to accuracy and its avoidance of spin, although in Croakey’s experience these things are not 
Continue reading at Croakey.

18 August 2011

Do not take it for granted: it is time to reinvent the toilet!

Lack of sanitation is affecting 2.6 billion people worldwide and it is one of the main contributors to burden of disease and health costs.



A multi-disciplinary team from the Water Engineering and Development Centre (WEDC) at Loughborough University led by Professor M.Sohail has won a grant in an international competition to “re-invent the toilet” organised by The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.



In the project’s first phase, the team will validate certain key principles to design a toilet, which will recover energy and other valuable resources from human excreta without disposing any hazardous waste that could threaten human and environmental health. Faeces will be transformed into a highly energetic combustible through a process combining hydrothermal carbonisation followed by combustion. The process will be powered by heat generated during the combustion phase of faeces processing.



The likely results are converting human waste into useful material for energy generation or soil conditioning, including water for hand-washing and other ablutions. The toilet must be able to work in both single-family and community environments and should cost just pennies a day per person to run.



More information here: http://tinyurl.com/3gnyg9p


17 August 2011

HIA is a benchmark indicator of sustainability for private companies’ investments

IFC, ICMM and its member mining companies, and other organizations have developed the Financial Evaluation tool for sustainability investment. The tool should help companies to assess the quality and effectiveness of their environmental, social, health and governance investments.



Health Impact Assessment is considered the most appropriate tool to deal with the community health issues and investments. The framework recognize the existence of different types of HIA from pure desk top exercise to comprehensive ones. The “best practice” score goes to HIA that adopt a broad definition of health and determinants of health, include enhancement opportunities and produce recommendations aligned with local government development plans and complements programs of other agencies.


More information on the framework here: http://fvtool.com/index.php

15 August 2011

HIA Vacancy: HIA Development Officer for South Wales

The Wales Health Impact Assessment Support Unit (WHIASU) is pleased to announce that a vacancy has arisen for a HIA Development Officer for South Wales.  The post will be based at Public Health Wales (PHW) in Cardiff and will be for 22.5 hours per week.

Details are available on the WHIASU website and at NHS Jobs. The post will be at NHS Pay Band 6 and the closing date for applications is August 25th 2011.  If you have any enquiries about the post, then please contact either Dr Eva Elliott  (from 22nd August) or Liz Green.

Two New HIA Articles

I found two new HIA articles:
Estimating the potential health impact and costs of implementing a local policy for food procurement to reduce the consumption of sodium in the county of los angeles
Gase L, Kuo T, Dunet D, Schmidt S, Simon P, Fielding J.
American Journal of Public Health, 101(8): 1501-1507. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2011.300138

Health impact assessments a tool for designing climate change resilience into green building and planning projects
Houghton A.
Journal of Green Building, 6(2): 66-87. doi:10.3992/jgb.6.2.66


Please contact me if you have any trouble accessing them.

10 August 2011

Plugging Health into Planning: Evidence and practice

Plugging Health into Planning
From Salim:

The Local Government Group have a new short guide on integrating health and spatial planning. 
It can be found at: http://www.idea.gov.uk/idk/aio/28692849 
Of note are the case studies Bristol, Cambridgeshire, Newham, NE Lincolnshire, Plymouth, Stockport, South Cambridgeshire and a host of smaller ones scattered throughout (Oxford, Stoke-on-Trent, Knowsley, Wakefield, Leicester, Darlington,  and many more).

5 August 2011

Prediction Tournament

The US government is sponsoring a prediction tournament. From Freakonomics:
"Tetlock and a few colleagues are embarking on an ambitious new study of prediction — and even better, that they’re looking for volunteers. Specifically, they’re looking for people “who have a serious interest in and knowledge about world affairs, politics, and global economic matters and are interested in testing their own forecasting and reasoning skills.” 
Looks like it'll be interesting. You can sign up here.

3 August 2011

HIA 3 Day Training Course, Sydney 5-7 October 2011

The University of New South Wales is running a three day training course in health impact assessment in Sydney from 5-7 October 2011. The flyer for the course can be downloaded from:

http://benhr.net/pGIJ0I

If you're interested or have any queries please contact Mary Knopp on +62 2 9612 0779 or email mary.knopp@sswahs.nsw.gov.au

Social Impacts Alert for July

Allison Ziller does such a terrific job with her Social Impacts Alerts. Here's the one for July:

Fun
A ‘transfer accelerator’ or a bit of urban fun?: http://popupcity.net/2011/07/slide-to-the-train/

In The Press
Adele Horin, The dark legacy of child abuse, SMH 2-3 July 2011, “A hidden history of child abuse may lie behind the myriad social problems that afflict Australia, from its high rate of depression to its high rate of homelessness. We are more aware, partly thanks to the wayward Catholic clergy, of the existence of child abuse. But that has not translated into an understanding of its pervasive and long-lasting legacy.” http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/society-and-culture/the-dark-legacy-of-child-abuse-20110701-1gv68.html#ixzz1RtYWQG67


Deborah Smith, Dementia is a major killer poorly understood, SMH 4 July 2011: “The world needs more famous people to speak out about their dementia, according to a visiting brain expert. Baroness Susan Greenfield, a neuroscientist at Oxford University, said there was an ''inexplicable and disturbing disparity'' between the amount of money spent on research on dementia compared with other conditions such as cancer and heart disease. Greater awareness of brain degeneration might help overcome this.” http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/lifematters/appeal-to-hear-the-silent-voices-of-dementia-20110703-1gxfv.html#ixzz1Rta9V4Yi

1 August 2011

HIA Gateway: What's new for July

Every time I receive this update I'm reminded how fortunate we are to have the HIA Gateway.


Reports
HIA of City Centre and Etruria Road, AAP, Stoke. 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=106107 

Local Transport Plan 3: Health Impact Assessment (Stoke-on-Trent) 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=106019 

MWIA of Single Point of Access Hub: telford 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105936 

Art into Life: gallery workshops for older adults. MWIA 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105935 

Guides
Mining: Partnerships for development Toolkit 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=106014 

Top 10 Things to engage patients: online technology (US) 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=106013 

Integrated Environmental Impact Assessment System (IEHIAS) 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105947 

Plugging health into planning: evidence and practice 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105840 

Evaluation
Wellness services: evidence review & good practice 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105856 

Tools
Housing Insights for Communities: tool (Shelter) 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=106015 

Mining: Partnerships for development Toolkit 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=106014 

Integrated Environmental Impact Assessment System (IEHIAS) 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105947 

Current Use
Mental Wellbeing Impact Assessment Newsletter: June 2011 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105908 

Wellness services: evidence review & good practice 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105856 

Theory Issues
Measuring well-being: briefing 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105854 

Participation in placemaking (Scottish Government) 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105851 

Training Courses
Online HIA Introductory Training Course 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=106067 

One day Introduction to MWIA, 21st September, Venue TBC 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105907 

Events
SEA Implementation & Practice: Making an Impact? Prague, 21 - 23 September 2011 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105916 

WELL-BEING 2011: Exploring the Multi-dimensions of Well-being, 18-19th July, Birmingham 
http://www.apho.org.uk/resource/item.aspx?RID=105839