Practice, Policy and Partners to Achieve Equitable Health and Safety Outcomes

When public health officials envision the best ways to advance healthier, more equitable communities, they see bountiful opportunities to change policies, systems and institutional practices. Transportation systems can support walking and biking, housing policy can provide equal access to healthy homes, and schools and employers can ensure that children and families have safe and sustainable opportunities to learn and work.

In some cases, changing health outcomes means stepping outside of the traditional boundaries of public health and engaging with city and county officials or community based agencies to leverage resources, change institutional paradigms and ensure that colleagues outside of the health sector make decisions with health in mind.

Prevention Institute's Tool for Health and Resilience in Vulnerable Environments (THRIVE) serves as a centerpiece for a recently developed Health Equity Toolkit, which was designed to highlight local-level actions that can positively influence social and community determinants of health. Developed with input from NACCHO's Health Equity and Social Justice Strategic Direction Team, the Health Equity Toolkit is an online resource that focuses on policies and organizational changes that local health practitioners and community based organizations can take to bolster their efforts to achieve health equity.