Cities, Health and Well-being

Wolfgang Nowak (Alfred Herrhausen Society) ended the 10th Urban Age conference in Hong Kong and two days of interdisciplinary discussion and debate with a call to ‘make the invisible visible’ in relation to social, economic and health inequity. Ricky Burdett (LSE Cities) pushed the expert audience to make their research accessible and intelligible to policy makers, government and the private sector in order to effect lasting change.

Some 200 academics, policy-makers, practitioners and activists grappled with the complex and compelling issues that come together in urban health and well-being, joined by nearly 1000 people watching a live stream online. Their different disciplines and city contexts could easily have made this a fragmented and frustrating experience. Rather, participants chose to be open to their differences as well as their commonalities, and to engage with the worst as well as the best of cities. You can watch the full videos of the conference presentations and discussion online now, and read the full Urban Age Hong Kong press archive.

To coincide with the conference, LSE Cities released major new research on metropolitan health and well-being, as well as intra-urban analysis of health and social indicators in Hong Kong, qualitative research with residents of four dense neighbourhoods (together with conference partners at the University of Hong Kong), and a compilation of 30 city case studies and framing papers by conference participants and collaborators.

Help to keep this debate alive and stay up to date with our on-going research by connecting with us on Facebook and Twitter (@LSECities), and by signing up to our mailing list. Please contact Myfanwy Taylor (m.m.taylor [AT] lse.ac.uk) if you have a specific question or comment.