In preparation for the Ministerial Conference in Italy in 2010, WHO organized two back to back meetings in Madrid in October 2008. The first of these, the International Public Health Symposium on Environment and Health Research - Science for Policy, Policy for Science: Bridging the Gap', focused on the science of environment and health, its complexity, and on current challenges. The main emphasis was on how to make science usable for policy development and evaluation. The Symposium concluded, inter alia, that there is a need to enhance current practices and to take a holistic and integrated approach, embracing complexity and addressing uncertainty. The Symposium included presentations from two current linked research projects, INTARESE and HEIMTSA, both funded by the European Commission (EC) under the 6^th Framework Programme. These two projects, and others, are developing methods to inform the development of policy, working within a framework that is becoming known as Integrated Environmental Health Impact Assessment (IEHIA).

To allow further discussions on IEHIA a second joint INTARESE-HEIMTSA workshop was held as a pre-event of the Thematic Meeting on Healthy Environments (28-29 January 2009), this time with an emphasis on ‘Developments in Integrated Environmental Health Impact Assessment, with special reference to policies that affect Indoor Air’.

The Workshop was attended by 45 participants representing European stakeholders and potential users of IEHIA; those interested in the science (academia and research institutions), the development of policy (governments and WHO) and those seeking to influence this (industry and NGOs). Attendance was helped by the focus on a relevant theme (Indoor air quality) and the proximity to meetings of the European Environment and Health Committee (EEHC).

To view the presentations please consult the attached files

Attachment	Size
Opening Remarks - Hurley.pdf	75.7 KB
The science of integrated assessment.pdf	47.46 KB
Science of integrated assessment.pdf	112.62 KB
Clean Air for Europe.pdf	832.24 KB
Applying new methodologies to Indoor Air.pdf	461.19 KB
Setting guidelines for indoor air.pdf	366.32 KB
BRIDGING THE GAP - Agenda.pdf	60.89 KB