Sonja Kahlmeier

• Dr. habil. MSc ETH
• Director at City Health

Background and objective Walking and cycling have shown beneficial effects on population risk of all-cause mortality (ACM). This paper aims to review the evidence and quantify these effects, adjusted for other physical activity (PA). Data sources We conducted a systematic review to identify relevant studies. Searches were conducted in November 2013...

Physical inactivity is one of the four leading behavioural risk factors for non-communicable disease (NCD). Like tobacco control, increasing levels of health-enhancing physical activity (HEPA) will require a national policy framework providing direction and a clear set of actions. Despite frequent calls, there has been insufficient progress on poli...

The role of regular physical activity for population health has been clearly documented. Improvements in population levels of physical activity require long-term implementation of a combination of measures, including the evidence based approaches described in the "seven best investments for physical activity" (www.globalpa.org.uk): whole-of-school...

HEPA Europe, the European network for the promotion of health-enhancing physical activity, will have its 10th annual meeting in 2014. Membership of the network has grown to 129 institutions from 32 countries. Collaborations have been established with the World Health Organization (WHO), the European Union (EU), Agita Mundo, the global network for p...

Objectives: Growing interest in physical activity has led to the development of a number of organizations, networks and associations, including grass-root, professional and academic institutions. To maximize relevance and effectiveness of work undertaken in this field, we aimed at developing a systematic overview of institutions active in health-en...

Increasing regular physical activity is a key public health goal. One strategy is to change the physical environment to encourage walking and cycling, requiring partnerships with the transport and urban planning sectors. Economic evaluation is an important factor in the decision to fund any new transport scheme, but techniques for assessing the eco...

Background: Physical inactivity is a leading risk factor for noncommunicable disease worldwide. Increasing physical activity requires large scale actions and relevant, supportive national policy across multiple sectors. Methods: The policy audit tool (PAT) was developed to provide a standardized instrument to assess national policy approaches to...

Objectives: Growing interest in physical activity has led to the development of a number of organizations, networks and associations, including grass-root, professional and academic institutions. To maximize relevance and effectiveness of work undertaken in this field, we aimed at developing a systematic overview of institutions active in health-en...

Although sport promotion may play an important role in achieving the recommended levels of physical activity for health, until now, there has been no comprehensive assessment of how sport policies in Europe address health. This article aimed at filling this gap by reviewing and analyzing recent national policy developments in the area of sport prom...

Physical activity has various health benefits. Active transport can contribute to total physical activity and thus affect body weight because of increased energy expenditure. This review summarizes published evidence on associations of active transport, general physical activity, and body weight in adults. A systematic review of the literature was...

National recommendations on physical activity for health are an important element of a comprehensive strategy to promote physical activity and sport. Switzerland has developed recommendations for adults in 1999 and for young people in 2006. International experts have recommended that in view of new global and international recommendations, countrie...

One promising public health intervention for promoting physical activity is the Ciclovía program. The Ciclovía is a regular multisectorial community-based program in which streets are temporarily closed for motorized transport, allowing exclusive access to individuals for recreational activities and physical activity. The objective of this study wa...

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) recognises the health and fitness benefits of physical activity (PA) and sport as stated in recommendation #51 from the Olympic Movement in Society Congress held in Copenhagen, 2009: Everyone involved in the Olympic Movement must become more aware of the fundamental importance of Physical Activity and sport...

A growing body of scientific evidence indicates that the declining levels of physical activity and fitness in children and youth are associated with adverse impacts on their health, including rising levels of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, metabolic syndrome and increased risk of sports injury. In response, a number of governmental and non-gover...

The World Health Organization and other international health promotion organisations and agencies have recognised physical inactivity as a major health risk factor. However, physical inactivity still receives less attention than other risk factors for non-communicable diseases (e.g. tobacco use, unhealthy diets and overweight). Therefore, in 2009 t...

Sport promotion plays a very important role in supporting the achievement of the recommended levels of physical activity in the European population. The aim of this document is to support advances in policy-making for physical activity promotion by highlighting recent national policy developments in the area of sports promotion, with a focus on syn...

Background There is growing interest in “Health in All Policies” approaches, aiming at promoting health through policies which are under the control of nonhealth sectors. While economic appraisal is an established practice in transport planning, health effects are rarely taken into account. An international project was carried out to develop guidan...

Background: There is growing interest in "Health in All Policies" approaches, aiming at promoting health through policies which are under the control of nonhealth sectors. While economic appraisal is an established practice in transport planning, health effects are rarely taken into account. An international project was carried out to develop guid...

Published in International Journal of Pediatric Obesity 2010; 5(Suppl. 1): 10–11.

The World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe and the Directorate-General for Health and Consumers of the European Commission have established a joint three-year project to monitor progress in improving nutrition and physical activity and preventing obesity in the European Union (EU). This review provides an overview of the identified pu...

The World Health Organization Regional Office for Europe and the Directorate-General for Health and Consumers of the European Commission have established a joint three-year project to monitor progress in improving nutrition and physical activity and preventing obesity in the European Union (EU). This report provides an overview of the available int...

Over the past years there has been increasing interest in physical activity promotion and the development of appropriate policy. So far, there has been no comprehensive overview of the activities taking place in Europe in this area of public health policy. Using different search methods, 49 national policy documents on physical activity promotion w...

We reviewed published and unpublished studies that presented the findings of an economic valuation of an aspect of transport infrastructure or policy, and included data on walking and/or cycling and health effects in the valuation. We included 16 papers, of which three were classified as ‘high; six as ‘moderate’ and seven as ‘low’ quality. There is...

There has been a world-wide increase in scientific interest in health-enhancing physical activity (HEPA). The importance of a physically active lifestyle has now been well established both on the individual and on the population level. At the same time, physical inactivity has become a global problem. While sports for all has a long history, only a...

Implementation of Public Health policies, programs and plans - Collaboration - Information management – Risk communication – Participation – Quality assurance, quality control - Evaluation

In carrying out two projects involving environmental health indicators--a national environmental health programme evaluation and an international environmental health indicator system--in parallel, it became apparent that an international indicator set has limitations regarding the evaluation of a national programme such as the Swiss National Envir...

Diss. Naturwiss. Basel (kein Austausch). Literaturverz.

The National Environment and Health Action Plans (NEHAPs) are a novel attempt to integrate environmental protection and health promotion in political programmes. Throughout Europe, about 40 NEHAPs have been developed so far. The Swiss NEHAP was among the first to be developed in an industrialised country. We discuss strength and weaknesses of the S...

To examine whether changes in environmental housing quality influence the wellbeing of movers taking into account other dimensions of housing quality and sociodemographic factors. Cross sectional telephone survey. Associations between changes in satisfaction with 40 housing quality indicators (including environmental quality) and an improvement in...