The Institute of Urban Environment (IUE), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) hosted an international meeting of Future Earth’s Knowledge Action Network for Health on Dec 2-4, 2017 in Xiamen, China.

The meeting is organized by the International Council for Science global program on Systems Science for Urban Health and Wellbeing which has its international program office at IUE, CAS.

Future Earth is a major international research platform providing the knowledge and support to accelerate transformations to a sustainable world.

One crucial research area is urban health; cities are especially important because they are where most people now live, and the health of people everywhere is tightly linked to the health of the places they inhabit. Cities contribute strongly to most processes of global change, including climate change. The ICSU global program on Systems Science for Urban Health and Wellbeing brings together leading global researchers in this area. It has identified persistent and emerging health risks from rapid urbanization and their close linkages to natural systems, and has laid the foundations for a systems approach to translating knowledge to action for these complex, interconnected challenges.

The Future Earth Health Knowledge-Action Network calls on health researchers, other natural and social scientists, health and environmental policy experts, and leaders in government, the private sector and civil society to engage across disciplines and sectors and jointly promote research for better, integrated understanding of the complex interactions between our changing global environment and the health of human beings.

This meeting assembled health experts from Asia, Africa and Latin America, along with city representatives charged with making cities healthier and more sustainable. They exchanged perspectives and evidence on the challenges of improving health in urban environments, and identified opportunities to move from knowledge to effective action.

The scientists and policymakers exchanged their experiences on urban health priorities and the challenges they confront in acting on existing knowledge. Based on this unique exchange of global and regional perspectives, participants identified the most pressing needs of healthy, sustainable urban development and together, issued a call for action to the global science and policy communities.