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Belfast Healthy Cities

Our vision is that Belfast is recognised globally
as a healthy, equitable and sustainable city

Healthy Cities 21st Century

News Stories

Queen’s University Belfast innovative SPACE project explores the link between where we live and its effect on dementia and brain health as we get older. Preventing dementia and cognitive decline is a global health priority. During this webinar the WHO European Healthy Cities Network will outline the current priorities of the Healthy Ageing Task Force member cities to support ageing populations across Europe.

Would you like the opportunity to travel to a WHO European Healthy City to learn more about your area of work?

One of the major benefits of being a member of WHO European Healthy Cities Network is the opportunity to learn how other cities address health and well-being in its widest sense.  It provides new insights, knowledge and best practice, which can then be applied to work in Belfast.

Belfast Healthy Cities has been working in partnership with the Ministerial Advisory Group (MAG), Department for Communities and schools in east Belfast to pilot ‘walking buses’.

We have been excited to work with Braniel Primary School who pioneered the walking bus model during early March. The children were delighted to be joined by the Chronicles of Narnia characters. The walking bus supported over 500 individual walking trips throughout the week, with the busiest morning involving approximately 150 children.         

A partnership involving Belfast Healthy Cities; the Care Zone Project team; the Care Zone Community Champions; Youth Education health and advice (YEHA); primary schools and Expert Advisors to the Ministerial Advisory Group (MAG), for Architecture and the Built Environment for Northern Ireland jointly developed and trialled walking buses during ‘Walk to School’ week in May 2022.

The final chapters of the City Profile of Belfast have been launched. Peace and Participation complete the full chapters of the Belfast - Profiling Health, Wellbeing & Prosperity profile report, which look at a range of determinants of health and well-being across Belfast, monitoring trends and comparators across the city. 

Belfast Healthy Cities is celebrating individuals and organisations that strive to make Belfast a healthier city with their annual awards. Now in its 10th year, the 2022 Healthy Cities Awards will highlight the work which is taking place right across the city to improve the health and wellbeing of citizens in Belfast.

The awards categories have been widened this year to ensure that even more organisations working in the community have an opportunity to enter. The new categories will still reflect the ethos of the WHO Healthy Cities programme.

The Pharmacy Schools Programme is freely available, in a range of languages, for Primary Schools with lesson plans and resources for Primary 1 – Primary 7 and supports delivery of Personal Development and Mutual Understanding area of learning of the Northern Ireland Curriculum.

The launch of the third and fourth chapters in our profile of Belfast took place in August with an online seminar featuring Belfast Healthy Cities Expert Advisor Erica Ison; Victoria Ramsey, Climate Services Scientist with the UK Met Office; and Joan Devlin, our Chief Executive. The session was chaired by BHC Board Member Ian Montgomery. 

Belfast Healthy Cities, the World Health Organization initiative in Northern Ireland, has welcomed four new board members as they embark on the roll out of Phase VII (2020-2026) of the WHO Healthy Cities programme. 

The new members will help support the organisation as they begin to develop a range of programmes based upon the priorities of Phase VII, which has its roots in the Belfast Charter, agreed at the Healthy Cities International Conference held in Belfast in 2018. 

The second chapter of our profile of the city has been launched, with an online seminar featuring expert speakers from Belfast and WHO.  The Prosperity chapter follows the launch of the People chapter in May, and make up the first two chapters of the full

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