Working Group 4

WG4 Leaders

HEART | WELLBASED | eMOTIONAL Cities

Scope

Epidemic, as well as pandemic risks, are handled and mapped as a result of interactions between various factors including urban ones, such as air quality, climate, green indices, biodiversity, land use, ecology, and socio-economic factors, which determine the pace that new pathogens emerge and spread around. COVID19 pandemics have also made evident that some groups of the population are more vulnerable to pandemics than others.  Inequalities act as a multiplier on pandemic spread and deadliness, especially in cities.  This WG will explore further the relation between urban parameters, health inequalities and epidemics while focusing on:

• • The development of a comprehensive framework/establish a conversation to understand these accelerator mechanisms and explore how to detect in advance risky situations that will lead to further inequalities in health in the context of epidemics.
  • The potential contribution of various urban ecosystem services and healthier urban planning in order to optimise the defence against epidemics eventually leads to the development of a methodology that unveils how, and how much, the urban design and urban form contribute to epidemics
  • The impact of climate change and various weather extremes such as heatwaves, floods, etc. to the spread of specific pathogens (in particular viruses).
  • Identification of groups of the population more vulnerable (gender, ethnicity, age -older people, people with multi-morbidity and chronicity, for instance).
  • Identification of causes or social determinants of health (overcrowded dwellings, housing conditions, type of job, etc.) for new and pre-existing inequities.
  • Data and tools to monitor these health inequalities.
  • Strong dissemination, communication and standardisation activities and coordination collaboration with relevant initiatives, including One Health (who.int)

The main target is to contribute to the preparatory groundwork toward an innovative and visionary Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda for urban planning and preparedness against epidemic threats.