Health Impact Assessment
Bringing Public Health Data to Decision Making

Momentum is building in the HIA field as more and more cities, states, tribal and federal agencies seek better ways to factor health into their decisions. The Health Impact Project and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have identified nearly 120 HIAs that have been completed or are in progress in 24 states. Local planning departments, state environmental regulators and federal agencies carrying out environmental impact statements are beginning to request health impact assessments as well.

As initiatives progress at all levels of government, many opportunities exist to incorporate HIA and build healthier policies. Examples include:

• Government officials at all levels should use HIA for important new decisions outside the health sector—including, for example, transportation, housing and urban planning, educational programming, agricultural policy, and energy and natural resource projects—to minimize unnecessary risks and unanticipated costs and to help create healthier communities.
• Executive branch agencies involved in major infrastructure projects, such as Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Transportation, should consider ways to use HIA as a means to integrate health consider- ations in current and future initiatives.
• The newly established, cabinet-level and multi-agency National Prevention, Health Promotion, and Public Health Council should recommend that any federal agency that is making decisions with potentially significant health effects should use HIA.
• In spring 2011, the National Academy of Sciences plans to release a report on HIA, which is intended to provide guidance to federal, tribal, state and local agency officials and others. Once this report becomes available, agencies should consult it to determine where there are opportunities to apply HIA in decisions that have a potential for significant health effects.