Effective global health promotion achievements, tools, and strategies used in the Americas over the past decade.

ABSTRACT

There have been numerous international commitments made by governments from around the world to promote health and prevent illness and disease. As globalization increases our interdependence with both positive and negative effects, the World Health Organization and the Pan American Health Organization (its Regional Office for the Americas), have responded to ever increasing mandates from their member countries by developing responses to support governments in promoting health and incorporating upstream approaches into their policies, programs and activities. This article highlights some of the most important of these political declarations that have direct impact on health education and promotion ranging from the Alma Ata Declaration on Primary Health Care in 1978 to the Rio Declaration on the Social Determinants of Health in 2011. Additionally, emphasis is placed on identifying and providing examples of the application of specific tools, strategies and approaches to facilitate fulfillment of these mandates; ones that should be useful for health education and promotion practitioners everywhere. It closes by raising some of the challenges that health education and promotion will face in the future given the current trends in the world today.