An introduction to health impact assessment

Abstract

Health impact assessment (HIA) is a structured and stepwise process for identifying the potential beneficial and harmful health impacts of a policy, program, development or project proposal before its implementation, with the purpose of using this information to improve the proposal. A widely used and accepted definition of HIA is: A combination of procedures, methods and tools by which a policy, program or project may be assessed for its potential, and often unanticipated, effects on the health of the population and the distribution of these impacts within the population.