Health promotion as a means to strengthen public health

Together with population health assessment, health surveillance, disease and injury prevention, and health protection, health promotion is a central public health function that furthers all public health work. [...] This paper is structured as follows: 1. Recommended health promotion improvements to the mandatory guidelines 2. Examples of a strengthened population health approach3 within public health from other jurisdictions in Canada 3. An overview of health promotion 4. Contact information for OPC and acknowledgements 1. RECOMMENDED HEALTH PROMOTION IMPROVEMENTS TO THE 1997 ONTARIO PUBLIC HEALTH MANDATORY [...] Population health is an approach to health that aims to improve the health of the entire population and to reduce health inequities among population groups. [...] Each writing committee should: • explicitly explore enhanced population health roles for health units; • employ actions to deploy resources in ways that address the range of health promotion means and actions, including some requirement to influence policies and community and environmental supports; and • define requirements and indicators to ensure that all public health programs work with other [...] British Columbia and Quebec, however, are already strongly committed to targeting public health resources and functions to address determinants of health and population health.