City Know-hows

How do we achieve more effective housing policy for health?

A journey to healthy housing policy

Generating awareness and evidence of existing housing conditions and their health impacts are fundamental. That makes it possible to collaborate across sectors and with stakeholders, establishing effective enforcement and tackling issues concerning private rights.

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Target audience

Policy makers, urban leaders, expert groups on housing

The problem

There is a lack of housing policy that stipulates requirements for health. A recent publication from WHO, its Housing and Health Guidelines re-focuses us all on the need to consider housing when providing healthy environments.

What we did and why

We completed a review of the literature that discussed the development and implementation of healthy housing policy, to understand what worked and to guide the development of this policy area.

Our study’s contribution

Our evidence review sets out lessons for those who are working in housing and health to take forward and then enable better policy development and implementation.

Impacts for city policy and practice

What enables health housing policy development and implementation?

We need to

  • Generate awareness and evidence of existing housing conditions and health impacts.
  • Collaborate across sectors, with residents and decision-makers.
  • Develop effective enforcement systems, that use incentives, inspections and certifications for compliance.
  • Tackle economic concerns and tensions around private rights.

Further information

Full research article:

Getting to effective housing policy for health: a thematic synthesis of policy development and implementation by Emily Nix, Andrew Ibbetson, Ke Zhou, Michael Davies, Paul Wilkinson, Ramona Ludolph, and Helen Pineo.

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