Event details
5th Annual European Public Health Conference
All Inclusive Public Health
Portomaso, St. Julian?s, Malta
Hilton Conference Centre
8 ? 10 November 2012
The European Public Health Association (EUPHA), the Association of Schools of Public Health in the European Region (ASPHER) and the Malta Association of Public Health Medicine (MAPHM) are pleased to invite you to the 5th joint conference combining the 20th annual EUPHA meeting and 34th annual ASPHER meeting.
The European Public Health Conference aims to contribute to the improvement of public health in Europe by offering a means for exchanging information and a platform for debate to researchers, policy makers, and practitioners in the field of public health and health services research as well as public health training and education in Europe.
The major topics of Malta 2012 are:
- Mind, body and spirit ? a multifaceted approach to health
- Life choices ? population, economic activity and lifestyle
- Research across health - services, sectors and policy
- Technology and environment ? getting smart with health determinants
- Small, few or different ? Inequality in Europe?s health
All Inclusive Public Health
From cities to schools, in the community and within hospitals, the sphere of influence of public health to protect health and foster wellbeing is all inclusive and ubiquitous.
Over the decades, its initial major preoccupation with the prevention and control of infectious disease has progressed to a far wider concern regarding wellbeing and health, assessing our homes, our working environments and even the air we breathe. While seeking population protection on large scales in major cities, we are also trying to determine how, at the electron microscope level, mankind?s genes may be either a threat or of benefit to health.
However, public health is increasingly focusing on providing individuals with the opportunity to develop to their maximum potential. Hence, essentials such as basic nutrition, safe housing, a rounded education, physical and psychological well-being and an opportunity for work are still at the very core of population health.
Although the sciences within public health have evolved and become more refined, the basic elements of human development and health remain unchanged. Improving health behaviour remains a major challenge to public health amid media messages urging people to indulge their senses. Norms in society also continue to change rapidly and what may be commonplace at one stage of life may become irregular at another.
Modern health threats such as obesity, drug abuse or alcoholism ? all of which threaten Europe?s young and not so young today - cannot be tackled within the health sector in isolation. Intersectoral collaboration involving education, industry and welfare are crucial in fostering better health among the population.
Currently, an unfavourable European economic climate has also served to remind us about the fragility of our structures and programmes and on how these depend on a positive industrial sector powered by a dynamic skilled and healthy workforce. Such interdependence between health, industry, environment and education highlights the span of public health and how essential it is to be collaborating rather than insular, working towards common goals instead of competing for limited resources.
An ageing European population is currently served by a well-developed public health work force which has implemented numerous policies to improve health while continuing to remain at the forefront of global health service development and research.
We welcome you to Malta 2012 at the 5th European Public Health Conference, from the 7th to the 10th November, 2012
As our greeting goes - Sahha!! (Health).
We look forward to welcoming you to Malta?s shores and continuing our public health debate.
For more information, see the EUPHA website.