Strategies

What Works for Health includes evidence-informed strategies to create communities where everyone can thrive.

42 Strategies
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Bicycle & pedestrian master plans

Establish a framework to increase walking and biking trails and improve connectivity of non-auto paths and trails in a particular area
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Housing and transportation
  • Diet and exercise
  • Climate

Societal Rules

  • Institutional practices
  • Governance

Child-focused advertising restrictions for unhealthy foods & beverages

Restrict child-focused advertising for unhealthy foods and beverages via bans on unhealthy food and drink ads during children’s TV programs, product placement in children’s movies, etc.
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Diet and exercise

Societal Rules

  • Laws and policies

College-based obesity prevention educational interventions

Support multi-component educational interventions for college students that address nutrition, physical activity, and healthy weight management; often with environmental modifications
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Diet and exercise

Community gardens

Establish and support land that is gardened or cultivated by community members via community land trusts, gardening education, zoning regulation changes, or service provision (e.g., water or waste disposal)
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Diet and exercise
  • Climate
  • Civic and community resources

Community kitchens for food processing

Establish shared kitchen spaces that support licensed, commercial food processing and connect specialty food processors, farmers, and others who produce value-added goods
Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion

Community Conditions

  • Diet and exercise
  • Civic and community resources

Community supported agriculture (CSA)

Establish partnerships between farmers and consumers in which consumers purchase a share of a farm’s products in advance
Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion

Community Conditions

  • Diet and exercise
  • Climate
  • Civic and community resources

Community weight loss challenges

Support temporary programs that work to energize participants to lose weight via prizes, often combined with education, weight status and food intake tracking, regular check-ins, and group support
Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion

Community Conditions

  • Diet and exercise

Community-wide physical activity campaigns

Engage a variety of partners in a highly visible, multi-component effort to increase physical activity, often with efforts to address cardiovascular disease risk factors
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Diet and exercise

Electronic Benefit Transfer payment at farmers markets

Enable farmers markets to accept EBT, the electronic payment system of debit cards used to issue and redeem Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits
Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion

Community Conditions

  • Diet and exercise

Extracurricular activities for physical activity

Provide chances for kids and adolescents to be active and play sports at various skill levels via structured or unstructured after and before school athletic activities
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Diet and exercise