Toward a healthy future: Second report on the health of Canadians

Toward a Healthy Future: Second Report on the Health of Canadians is the result of a collaborative effort by the Federal, Provincial and Territorial Advisory Committee on Population Health (ACPH), Health Canada, Statistics Canada, the Canadian Institute for Health Information and a project team from the Centre for Health Promotion, University of Toronto.

The role of the Advisory Committee is to advise the Conference of Deputy Ministers of Health on national and interprovincial strategies to improve the health status of the Canadian population and to provide a more integrated approach to health. As the title suggests, this is the second report to summarize and comment on the state of the nation’s health.

The first report was released in September 1996. The current report differs from the first one in several ways. It puts more emphasis on the influence of gender and socioeconomic status on health. Chapters on healthy child development and biology and genetics have been added in order to paint a picture that includes all of the major determinants of health. The section on the physical environment has been expanded to provide a better understanding of how it impacts on the health of all Canadians. This report summarizes the most current information we have on the health of Canadians, and invites the reader to consider the implications of these findings for current and future policies, practices and research. It is a tool to alert policy makers, practitioners and the public to current and future challenges in health, and to help identify actions that can be taken to improve the health of Canadians.