President's Column: Health promotion in the local community

Abstract

There is both a strong political and economic rationale for governments to invest more in community based public health research and practice. The World Health Organisation therefore has significantly supported the shaping of health promoting settings at work, in hospitals, in schools and in local communities. Health promotion requires partnerships for health and social development between the different sectors at all levels of the community. New health challenges mean that new and diverse networks need to be created to achieve intersectoral collaboration. Rapid processes of change in the community represent a challenge to public health policy. Public health research and practice should focus not only on factors causing disease and injuries (pathogenesis), but also factors promoting health (salutogenesis) in the perspective of health promotion and prevention in different settings. Tomorrow's society will most probably focus more on that which strengthens health, namely the salutogenic (health causing) factors as described by Antonovsky.1 Health promotion is carried out by and with people, not on or to people.2 It improves both the ability of individuals to take action, and the capacity of groups, organisations or communities to influence the determinants of health. “Settings for health” represent the organisational base of the infrastructure required for health promotion. New health challenges mean that new and diverse networks need to be created to achieve intersectoral collaboration. Such networks should provide mutual assistance within and between countries and facilitate exchange of information on which strategies are effective in which settings. Partnerships for health promotion and new and diverse networks have been created to achieve intersectoral collaboration in a local community in Norway.3 The aim was to create a common arena and forum for wholeness thinking and creativity, in order to improve environment, quality of life and health among people in the local community.4 …