Quality of life

Ask people to imagine their ideal community and what they describe is a modern version of a 19th century European market town: a place that is built to human scale; small and compact yet technologically and ecologically sophisticated; where all the activities of daily life are located within walking distance; where the absence of cars means that children can play safely and people can greet their neighbours while strolling on the sidewalk; and where trees and grass and flowers are plentiful.

The message is obvious: What people want is quality of life. They want their children to be healthy and happy and safe, they want to work close to home at meaningful jobs for which they are fairly compensated, they want to have time for recreation and learning. Most of all, they want human connections. What people are describing when they talk about their ideal town or city is a healthy community. Not very many exist—yet. But for more than 10 years now, a movement called ‘Healthy Cities/Healthy Communities’ has been helping communities to cure their ills—or better yet, to prevent them.

The movement emerged from the concerns of people in diverse countries about the deterioration of their communities. It was sparked in 1984 by a one-day workshop—Healthy Toronto 2000—organized in conjunction with a conference on healthy public policy. There, staff from the World Health Organization (WHO) recognized an opportunity to put health promotion concepts into practice in Europe. Two years later, Healthy Cities projects were initiated in 11 European cities.

Municipalities in at least 50 countries were participating by 1996, when WHO chose Healthy Cities as the theme for its annual World Health Day. To date, participating communities number in the thousands worldwide.

Given current trends, nothing could be more important than an initiative aimed at improving the quality of life and health in cities. By the year 2000, almost half the world’s population will live in and around urban areas. In the industrialized countries, growth is increasingly taking place in suburban areas, which puts even more demands on transportation, housing and other services because of the suburbs’ dispersion and low population density. For children, especially in neighbourhoods left behind by economic progress, Healthy Cities/ Healthy Communities is a tool for fulfilling the rights pledged in the Convention on the Rights of the Child—among them, the right to health care, to education and to housing, as well as the right to play and to participate in society.