The future of public health practice in Europe

Abstract

The European Public Health Association (EUPHA) identifies research, training, policy and practice as the four pillars for all its work. At a conference organised by the Association of School of Public Health in the European Region (ASPHER) in May 2016, an interesting session setting out a vision for these four areas for the coming years was organised. Josep Figueras and John Middelton outlined the challenges facing training and policy respectively in this session. They invited us to think outside the box and in a sense to reinvent public health in the 21st century. In this contribution, I focus on public health practice. Public health practitioners, who constitute an important part of EUPHA’s membership, are persons who typically work at the front line to translate research and policy into meaningful initiatives at local level.