TOWARDS ESTABLISHMENT OF A PAN-EUROPEAN INFORMATION SYSTEM TO STRENGTHEN POLICY-MAKING IN ENVIRONMENT AND HEALTH

Abstract

ISEE-380 Introduction: Recognizing the need for a harmonized methodology to evaluate the effects of policies and interventions to improve environmental quality on health, WHO - ECEH, Bonn is developing an Environment and Health Information System (EHIS) in collaboration with several Member States and international organisations. The central part of the system is environmental health (EH) indicators, which allow monitoring population health status related to the risks and their determinants in ten major environmental issues. The indicators provide appropriate information to compare the environmental health situation across the countries to facilitate policy planning and evaluation at local, national, and international levels. Methods: A multinational pilot study was conducted applying the developed methodology to test the proposed EH indicator set, data gathering requirements, and reporting techniques. The primary study outcome consisted of a pilot report on four key thematic chapters dealing predominantly with the urban environment. The report provides a framework of integrated environmental public health assessments using EH indicators. Results: The internationally coordinated pilot effort to opt for a ′core' set of indicators presents a remarkable step towards the establishment of a European EHIS. The indicators are linked with mechanisms and tools for extracting the relevant information from the existing national statistics, monitoring and surveillance systems. Examples of good practice in the EH indicator fact-sheet illustrate the important system element – reporting indicators to support the process of policy analysis and evaluation. The project has developed an EH indicator web ′portal' prototype to serve a vehicle for information exchange and dissemination of results. It enables reporting indicators to different target users by structuring the information in several ′levels of detail' (e.g. data, indicators, fact-sheets etc.). Case studies from the pilot indicator-based report illustrate various effective methods of coherent reporting on each part of the information as interlinked with processes along the cause – effects stream to assess potential impacts of policies and interventions on health. These methods can both facilitate answering key questions and provide guidance on future policies and actions in the field of environmental public health. Conclusions: Challenges ahead are: to close the gap between data and knowledge; to further validate and quantify the underlying conceptual models; and most importantly, to maintain regular indicator-based reporting while adjusting to new evidence, methodology or user needs of information. Environmental epidemiology should provide cost-effective and feasible methods for health-relevant monitoring, information analysis and interpretation. Acknowledgements: WHO Working Groups composed of 67 experts from 24 Member countries contributed to the pilot implementation of selected core EH indicators.