The objective of this thesis was to develop and evaluate an integrated health impact assessment of traffic policy measures. The integration is twofold. First, different transport-related risk factors are integrated into one assessment: road safety, exposure to traffic-related air Pollution and the health effects of physical activity. Second, a more vertical integration in which knowledge on the effect of policies on behaviour is integrated in the assessment, providing a complete chain from human (travel) behaviour to health. Doing so, attention is paid to the challenges Health Impact Assessment HIA currently faces. It is explored to what extent such an integrated assessment can provide an answer to these challenges, i.e. how to deal with a limited evidence base, acquiring insight in the variability of effects, providing valid results and the need for integration. The methods used are based on quantitative models, in which the health impact is expressed in Disability-Adjusted Life Years (DALY). DALY combine both the health loss due to mortality as disease/injury into one indicator. This unit can be interpreted as the amount of healthy life years that are lost because of death or disease resulting from a specific cause. (Author/publisher)
Abstract