‘Human health’ is an important aspect to be considered in environmental assessment (EA) in many regions of the world. We take EA to include Environmental Impact Assessment; Environmental and Social Impact Assessment; and Strategic Environmental Assessment. The course will elaborate on what is meant by a comprehensive consideration of ‘human health’ in EA. Whilst bio-physical (including chemical) aspects of relevance for human health are commonly included in EAs this can lead to other important determinants of health remaining unaddressed, including socio-economic factors, mental health and well-being and behavioural aspects. The portrayal of current practices and necessary changes to reflect new EA requirements is the main purpose of the course.

We will address the following questions:

• What does the consideration of human health in EIA mean?
• What is current practice?
• How can a robust and proportionate approach be applied to appropriately consider health in EIA?

Participants will critically examine existing EIA practices with regards to the consideration of health.

Furthermore, they will consider the skills that are needed for assessment teams to comprehensively assess health within EA, and for regulators who need to review the outputs of the assessment teams.

Level: Intermediate to Advanced

Prerequisites: None

Language: English

Duration: 2 days (6-7 May)

Min/Max: 10-30

Price: US$480

Instructors: Thomas Fischer, Professor and Director, University of Liverpool, Environmental Assessment and Management Research Centre, WHO Collaborating Centre for Health in Impact Assessments, School of Environmental Sciences (UK); Ben Cave, Director, Ben Cave Associates, Ltd., and University of Liverpool (UK); Francesca Viliani, Director Public Health, International SOS (Denmark)

Thomas B Fischer

He is a Professor in the School of Environmental Sciences, University of Liverpool, UK, and Director of the associated Environmental Assessment and Management Research Centre as well as the WHO Collaborating Centre for Health in Impact Assessments. He is also an extraordinary Professor of North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, South Africa, and an honorary staff member of the Berlin Institute of Technology, Germany.

His specialist areas revolve around ex-ante impact assessment tools in spatial, transport, energy, waste and other sectoral policy, plan, programme and project decision making, in particular environmental assessment (EA, both, EIA and SEA) and health in impact assessments. I have worked in consultancy, public administration and academia for nearly 30 years and have widely published on EA globally with over 85 papers in refereed academic journals, several books, numerous book chapters and monographs on the topic. He is editor-in-chief of IAIA’s Journal ‘Impact Assessment and Project Appraisal’. Furthermore, he has been a Fellow of the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment (FIEMA) since 2012 and a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy since 2016. He was a Professional Member of the ‘NHS National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence Public Health Programme Development Group for NICE guidance on Spatial Planning’ and is currently chair of the Ireland-UK branch of the IAIA. He is a member of IEMA’s EIA quality mark expert review team and have extensive teaching and training experience which spans over 20 years.

Ben Cave

He has specialised in health and environmental assessment for the last 20 years. He has worked across the UK, in mainland Europe and further afield with policy makers, public health academics, environment scientists and spatial planners. He provides public health and policy advice at a senior level in local, regional, national and international arena. He integrates health into environmental assessment (EA; EIA & ESIA) at project level: He leads HIAs in conjunction with EAs and focus on providing high quality HIAs that are robust and defensible. He has led HIAs in a wide range of sectors: for example, infrastructure for energy, mining, road and rail. He has prepared guidance on health in EIA with the World Health Organization and health in SEA with the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe and the European Investment Bank. He is committed to improving standards and quality in the field of impact assessment: He was President of IAIA. In 2009 he led research for, and development of, a review package for HIA reports with input from an expert panel of reviewers. He convened seminars on quality in impact assessment at the 2015, 2016, 2018 and 2019 annual meetings of the IAIA. His work contributes to national and international developments in impact assessment.

Francesca Viliani

She is the Director of Public Health at International SOS and a Chatham House fellow. At International SOS, I oversee the delivery of public health programs and Health Impact Assessment (HIA) globally. She has carried out HIA or health in other forms of impact assessment in Africa, Latin America, South East Asia. She has mainly worked on impact assessment of mega-infrastructure and energy projects. She has advised several Financial Institutions on their safeguards for health, safety and security, and she has been a consultant for WHO on extractive industries and public health. She supports private companies with setting up, managing and reporting on actions and partnerships for health. Over the last two decades she has worked with different organizations on pandemic preparedness and response plans, with a focus on whole of society response. She has written extensively on HIA and pandemic preparedness and response.