ABSTRACT
This chapter explains that health promotion encompasses a range of activities and that lots of people, in a variety of diverse roles, 'do' health promotion or actually 'promote health' – not just healthcare professionals themselves but a wide range of people working in a wide range of roles, from policy makers to teachers to community workers. The World Health Organization (WHO) has, in many ways, been at the forefront of developments in health promotion for the last few decades. In 1977 the Alma Ata Declaration resulted from the meeting of the WHO at the World Health Assembly. Health promotion is often referred to as an umbrella term, acknowledging that there are numerous ways of working. The settings approach to health promotion has its roots in the WHO's agenda dating from the Ottawa Charter. A great deal of health promotion intervention is targeted at certain sectors of the general population.
