ArticleBulletin of the World Health Organization2013
Untapped potential of health impact assessment.
Article in Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 44 papers, 3 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
44 citing papers in PubMed, 3 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Prospects and Perspectives of Health Impact Assessment: A Systematic Review of the Peer-Reviewed Literature From June 2007 to January 2023.Public health reviews · 2024Pooled it
- Health Impact Assessments of Health Sector Proposals: An Audit and Narrative Synthesis.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Pooled it
- Systematic Literature Review of Health Impact Assessments in Low and Middle-Income Countries.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2019Pooled it
- Integrated approaches to health: A paradigmatic, methodological and operational comparison of EcoHealth, One Health and Planetary Health.CABI one health · 2025Article
- 'Knowing how the machine works': a novel framework for engaging with the political determinants of health.BMJ global health · 2025Article
- Exploring the Impact of Mining on Community Health and Health Service Delivery: Perceptions of Key Informants Involved in Gold Mining Communities in Burkina Faso.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2023Article
- Current status and influencing factors of policy identification in health impact assessment: a case study of Zhejiang Province.Health research policy and systems · 2023Article
- The Built Environment and Health in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: a Review on Quantitative Health Impact Assessments.Current environmental health reports · 2022Review
- Article
- HIA and EIA Are Different, but Maybe Not in the Way We Thought They Were: A Bibliometric Analysis.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- Using health impact assessment (HIA) to understand the wider health and well-being implications of policy decisions: the COVID-19 'staying at home and social distancing policy' in Wales.BMC public health · 2021Article
- Associations between Natural Resource Extraction and Incidence of Acute and Chronic Health Conditions: Evidence from Tanzania.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- Lessons from an International Initiative to Set and Share Good Practice on Human Health in Environmental Impact Assessment.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Review
- Health impacts of industrial mining on surrounding communities: Local perspectives from three sub-Saharan African countries.PloS one · 2021Article
- Participatory quantitative health impact assessment of urban transport planning: A case study from Eastern Africa.Environment international · 2020Article
- The Role of the Private Sector in Supporting Malaria Control in Resource Development Settings.The Journal of infectious diseases · 2020Review
- Framework for Participatory Quantitative Health Impact Assessment in Low- and Middle-Income Countries.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2020Article
- Simulations of future cardiometabolic disease and life expectancy under counterfactual obesity reduction scenarios.Preventive medicine reports · 2020Article
- Inclusion of Health in Impact Assessment: A Review of Current Practice in Sub-Saharan Africa.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2020Review
- Community Health Impacts of the Trident Copper Mine Project in Northwestern Zambia: Results from Repeated Cross-Sectional Surveys.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The World Health Organization has promoted health impact assessment (HIA) for over 20 years. At the 2012 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20), HIA was discussed as a critical method for linking health to "green economy" and "institutional framework" strategies for sustainable development. In countries having a high human development index (HDI), HIA has been added to the overall assessment suite that typically includes potential environmental and social impacts, but it is rarely required as part of the environmental and social impact assessment for large development projects. When they are performed, project-driven HIAs are governed by a combination of project proponent and multilateral lender performance standards rather than host country requirements. Not surprisingly, in low-HDI countries HIA is missing from the programme and policy arena in the absence of an external project driver. Major drivers of global change (e.g. population growth and urbanization, growing pressure on natural resources and climate change) inordinately affect low- and medium-HDI countries; however, in such countries HIA is conspicuously absent. If the cloak of HIA invisibility is to be removed, it must be shown that HIA is useful and beneficial and, hence, an essential component of the 21st century's sustainable development agenda. We analyse where and how HIA can become fully integrated into the impact assessment suite and argue that the impact of HIA must not remain obscure.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.