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8Danang city departments engaged
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10Civil society orgs engaged
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3Focal points for systems mapping
Healthy Cities
We are part of a team of organizations implementing the USAID-funded Building Healthy Cities project in Danang, Vietnam, which aims to refocus city policies, planning, and services with a health equity lens while improving data-driven decision-making for smart cities.
Building Healthy Cities with JSI and USAID
East Meets West is part of a team of organizations implementing the USAID-funded Building Healthy Cities (BHC) project in Danang, Vietnam. The project aims to refocus city policies, planning, and services with a health equity lens while improving data-driven decision-making for Smart Cities in Indore, India, and Makassar, Indonesia. Planning for a Smart City is intrinsically linked to health: transportation, the natural and built environment, sanitation, education, recreation, and technology all influence the health of an urban population. When decision-making and data systems across these areas are harmonized to focus on equitable access to healthy lifestyles, people will benefit from improved access to health services, decreased environmental and lifestyle risk factors for chronic diseases, a lower burden of infectious diseases, and a wider access to data for decision-making. BHC is committed to documenting the processes, successes and failures of the project to bolster global learning on urban health and social determinants of health. To further this goal, BHC is developing dynamic systems maps for each city that help to document the context, leverage points, and actions taken during the course of the project. For the Building Healthy Cities project in Danang, there are three main focal points:
• Food safety
• School Health surveillance
• Healthy Tourism: air pollution, solid waste management potentially including plastics BHC is implemented by JSI Research & Training Institute, Inc. (JSI) with partners International Organization for Migration, Thrive Networks Global, and Urban Institute, and with support from Engaging Inquiry, LLC. To learn more about the project, or access reports other materials relevant to urban health, please visit jsi.com/buildinghealthycities.