This story was published in the SCMP’s Education Post on 25 January, 2017.
“Cities shape health and they will do so in the future at an accelerated rate.”
Professor Jeremy Myerson is a Helen Hamlyn Professor of Design at the Royal College of Art and one of the Britain’s 100 most influential people in digital technology, according to Wired Magazine. In Knowledge of Design Week (KODW) 2016, Myerson shared his expertise as an author and activist in design and innovation, with extensive credentials in ageing healthcare.
Professor Myerson presented a session titled Cities and Health: Seeing the Bigger Design Picture in which he encouraged a more holistic and proactive approach to managing society’s health problems. He suggested this can be achieved through a wider focus on lifestyle and encouraging the population to live more healthy lives, rather than managing healthcare through reactive facilities and programmes. Professor Myerson’s recommendation is that town planning and healthcare departments join forces to create ways for the community to get healthy and stay healthy, rather than nursing the masses back to health.
There are a lot of ways to do this, new spatial strategies for cities, new approaches to resisting infection, mobilising the masses into active travel, healthier homes, innovations in healthcare, and introducing new ways of working. Orchestrating each of these important elements to provide a town planning environment that allows a community to thrive and remain healthy is a tough task for governments but one that must be taken up, according to Professor Myerson.
Read the full article here.
Rebecca Simpson. Writer and editor. 