Ottawa Charter at 40

Forty years of health promotion

Health promotion is about enabling people to have greater control over their health and the factors that shape it. It combines action to strengthen people's knowledge and skills with efforts to create healthier environments, empower communities and influence public policy.

Its five action areas – healthy public policy, supportive environments, community action, personal skills and re-oriented health services – have helped guide four decades of health promotion worldwide.

The Charter's enduring contribution is the recognition that improving health requires action across society, not only within health services.

Shaping a healthier future

The world has changed profoundly since 1986. Climate change, widening inequalities, economic insecurity, social fragmentation and rapid technological transformation are creating new challenges for health and well-being.

But they also present opportunities to rethink how societies create health, share opportunities and measure progress.

A healthier, fairer future is possible – one in which everyone can grow up in a healthy environment, have a meaningful voice in decisions affecting their lives, benefit from fairer economic opportunities and live in communities that support their health and well-being.

Creating these conditions means looking beyond the treatment of illness towards the policies, investments and institutions that shape people’s everyday lives. It also means considering progress not only through economic growth, but through improvements in people's health, well-being, equity and the sustainability of the planet. This requires meeting the needs of people today while safeguarding the conditions that future generations will need to thrive. 

From principles to action

Today, countries are exploring ways to place well-being more firmly at the centre of public policy – from how governments set priorities and allocate resources to how they measure progress.

Health promotion offers practical approaches to support this shift, bringing together governments, communities and partners to address the wider determinants of health and strengthen people's ability to shape their own futures.

Forty years on, the Ottawa Charter remains a foundation for action – and an invitation to help create societies in which everyone can thrive, now and for generations to come.