Enabling the implementation of health impact assessment in Portugal

Overview

Health impact assessment (‎HIA)‎ is a means of assessing the health impacts of policies, plans and projects in diverse economic, social and environmental sectors using quantitative, qualitative and participatory techniques. The recent Portuguese strategy for protecting and promoting public health provides an important legal and policy entry point for the strategic goal of health in all policies, and for the more operational objective of facilitating HIA implementation at the national and local levels. This could be achieved by enabling the health sector to take leadership for HIA in Portugal. This report is a summary of a two-year capacity-building project supported by the WHO Regional Office for Europe, represented by the WHO European Centre for Environment and Health, and the Portuguese Ministry of Health, represented by the National Institute of Health Dr Ricardo Jorge. The process included three capacity-building workshops and supervision of three HIA case studies in Portugal.