Health impact assessment

The wellbeing approaches studied, with their reference frameworks and associated wellbeing indicators, are policy instruments for the entire government apparatus. Although these approaches have only recently been introduced and have been the subject of few evaluations, they appear promising. They are based on a vision of social, human, economic and environmental progress and rely on measurements that complement those of economic growth and GDP. Their adoption is intended to support what matters most to people, namely their wellbeing. 

The main features common to the wellbeing approaches of these central governments are:

• They are intended to be whole-of-government approaches, i.e., they involve the entire government apparatus, as well as other actors (departments, governmental and paragovernmental agencies, private sector actors, research groups, civil society, etc.).
• They view wellbeing as a multidimensional concept (e.g., with psychological, social, e…

This document is intended for public health authorities who wish to undertake a health impact assessment (HIA) in Indigenous contexts in Canada, practitioners working in the field of impact assessment, and Indigenous organizations that wish to undertake or participate in impact assessments.

Approaches to prospectively assessing the environmental, social and health impacts of policies, programs or projects are increasingly being implemented and standardized in a large number of countries. When these approaches are implemented in Indigenous contexts in Canada, that is, when they involve First Nations, Inuit or Métis, they raise specific issues related in large part to the gap that exists between the worldviews held in these communities and the Western approaches to evaluation that underpin the practice of impact assessment (IA). This discrepancy can be observed, in particular, in relation to conceptions of health, to knowledge systems, to the information used to estimate the e…

This briefing note is the fifth in a series of six focused on the state of the practice of integrated impact assessment (IIA). These documents focus, respectively, on:

1. Overall situation and clarification of concepts
2. Example of the practice of IIA at the European Commission
3. Example of the practice of IIA in France
4. Example of the practice of IIA in the United Kingdom
5. Example of the practice of IIA in Northern Ireland
6. Main challenges and issues tied to IIA

The practice of IIA, while it elicits a great deal of interest from many governments, ultimately remains little used at present. Several issues and challenges are associated with its institutionalization within governments. The 6th briefing note in this series, entitled Main Challenges and Issues Tied to IIA examines the difficulties as well as the benefits of the practice, based on the feedback collected and the literature consulted for the…

This briefing note is the last in a series of six focused on the state of the practice of integrated impact assessment (IIA). These documents focus, respectively, on:

1. Overall situation and clarification of concepts
2. Example of the practice of IIA at the European Commission
3. Example of the practice of IIA in France
4. Example of the practice of IIA in the United Kingdom
5. Example of the practice of IIA in Northern Ireland
6. Main challenges and issues tied to IIA

The series on IIA follows from a study conducted during the summer of 2012 at the request of the Government of Québec, which is exploring this issue. The objective of the study, carried out by the National Collaborating Centre for Healthy Public Policy (NCCHPP) on behalf of Québec’s Ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux (MSSS – the Ministry of Health and Social Services), was twofold: to examine the current state of th…

Health impact assessment (HIA) is an intersectoral approach that entails a series of work meetings requiring the coordination of the various actors participating in the process.

This guide is mainly designed for the team responsible for carrying out an HIA but also for anyone who would participate in an HIA process.

It contains information that should help the team responsible for the HIA determine, for each of the work sessions:

• the tasks to be carried out in preparation for the meeting;
• the meeting’s agenda;
• the support materials that might be required for the meeting;
• how much time to allocate for the meeting.

It also provides practical advice to ensure the meetings run smoothly.

To learn more, visit the website of the National Collaborating Centre for Healthy Public P…

Using a qualitative approach, researchers consider how Malartic residents have experienced changes in their community resulting from the development of an open pit mine and the effects of these changes on quality of life and social dynamics. They also collected residents’ opinions about risk management, their perceptions about health risks and their hopes and outlook for the future.

The main findings of the study are as follows:

• The arrival of the Canadian Malartic mine improved the quality of life for certain residents and revitalized the economy.
• The announcement and subsequent development of the mine had psychological impacts leading to feelings of distress, anger, demotivation, resignation and loss of trust in authority.
• The mine also had social impacts, including increased inequality between residents, conflict and community polarization.
• Among the social impacts, the two most often mentioned by respondents were the relocation…

The health impact assessment (HIA) process involves a variety of sectors other than the health sector and is intended to inform decision making. Considering knowledge sharing is therefore indispensable to maximizing the chances that the recommendations that result from the HIA are relevant and taken into account.

Those in charge of the HIA must be able to organize appropriate knowledge-sharing activities, taking into account stakeholder profiles, the decision-making context and the resources available.

In this briefing note, we first address the importance of knowledge sharing in the context of HIAs, and our preference for the term sharing rather than transfer of knowledge. Then, we propose and outline a framework borrowed from John Lavis and colleagues (2003), in order to guide the reader in developing a knowledge-sharing plan. The framework is structured around five simple questions to ask oneself: With whom is the knowledge to be shared? What is being shared? Who…

The National Collaborating Centre for Healthy Public Policy (NCCHPP) seeks to support the efforts of the Canadian public health community and its partners in promoting healthy public policy through more informed strategies. Among other things, the Centre focuses on Health Impact Assessment (HIA), a tool that helps shed light on decision making related to the development of policies, programs or projects that could have effects on the population’s overall health.

There are many HIA guides and tools. The NCCHPP identified them from the main Internet sites on the subject during the spring of 2008. The instruments are divided into three groups corresponding to the three following sections:

• general guides and orientation documents;
• applied guides and tools (particular activity sectors or themes);
• general tools.

Each guide and tool has specific characteristics. It is therefore up to users, whether they are decision makers, po…

During the winter of 2005, some 175 citizens and close to twenty experts participated in a wideranging dialogue aimed at generating ideas in support of a healthy Québec. These deliberations, organized by the Institut du Nouveau Monde (INM), brought to light the desire among citizens for the creation of a Bureau d'audiences publiques en santé (BAPS). Modelled on the Bureau d’audiences publiques sur l’environnement (BAPE – office of public hearings on the environment) created in 1978 in Québec, this new agency would provide citizens with a forum dedicated to assessing the potential health effects of any large scale project to be developed in the province. The citizens demanded: “That the government carry out a systematic prior assessment of the health impact of public policies and that it modify these policies to reduce their harmful effects” (Venne & Famhy, 2005, p.83) [Translation].

Such concerns have also been expressed in other Canadian provinces. On April 23, 2009, th…

Health impact assessment (HIA) is a process that makes it possible to shed light on decision making related to proposed policies, programs or projects, and on their potential effects on the health of a population. There are many approaches to the practice of HIA, the oldest having been developed within the field of environmental health in relation to the environmental impact assessment of development projects. The main focus of this inventory is the practice of HIA as related to the development of healthy public policy. This is an evolving field of practice in which more and more public health actors are becoming interested and with which they wish to become familiar.

This inventory is intended as an introduction to the field of health impact assessment (HIA) practice as applied to policy development. It is based on a review of the literature on this subject carried out by the National Collaborating Centre for Healthy Public Policy (NCCHPP) between March and July of 2008. An…