Centres for Research Development will build capacity in
Population and Public Health
| For immediate release- |
2004- 21 |
OTTAWA (November 1, 2004) - The Honourable Ujjal Dosanjh, Minister of Health, on behalf of the government and its partners, announced today along with Dr. Alan Bernstein, President of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) an investment of over $15 million to create seven Centres for Research Development.
"The Government of Canada recognizes that the health of Canadians is influenced by the places where they live, grow, play, work and learn," said Minister Dosanjh. "Last week I had the opportunity to meet with researchers at the University of Toronto where I heard about the innovative and exciting ways Government of Canada investments are being put to work for Canadians, such as through these Centres for Research Development."
The CIHR Institute of Population and Public health is funding these unique Centres in partnership with the Canadian Lung Association; Association pulmonaire du Québec; L'Institut de recherche Robert-Sauvé en santé et en sécurité du travail (IRSST), and the CIHR Strategic Initiative in Rural and Northern Health Research.
The Centres will be developed over the next six years. They will focus on understanding and addressing the impacts that physical and social environments have on health. This will be done through an analysis of policies and programs that affect the quality of environments, and will be jointly governed by research-users and researchers. This novel arrangement is designed to maximize the transfer of research results into practical applications and the development of new policies and programs that will lead to population-health benefits.
"The effects of physical and social environments on human health are not always optimal and sometimes, poorly understood," said Dr. Bernstein. "Through the active engagement of policy makers and community leaders, these Centres, the first of their kind in Canada, will build research capacity to better understand and address the impacts of programs and policies that help to improve the quality of these environments."
The seven Centres will be led by:
"The Lung Association is pleased to support the Health Centres initiative. We are actively involved in the delivery of lung health education and support programs. We strive to influence policy in order to ensure improved lung health across Canada" said Deirdre Freiheit.
"Asthma continues to be on the rise in Québec and is therefore an important priority for the Association pulmonaire du Québec," stated Louis P. Brisson.
"The development of partnership research produces a vast number of knowledge, access to more advanced expertise not available within a given organization, collaborations of all kinds, and the opportunity to transfer knowledge among partners," said Diane Gaudet, President and Director General, IRSST. "Clearly, partnerships will play a determining role in the increasingly complex issues involved with the changes in the work world."
Interdisciplinary research teams involved in this initiative will network across institutions and provide mentoring. Part of each Centre's role will be to create a sustainable source of funding by complementing the core infrastructure support with research investments from other sources.
The Canadian Institutes of Health Research is the Government of Canada's agency for health research. Its objective is to excel, according to internationally accepted standards of scientific excellence, in the creation of new knowledge and its translation into improved health for Canadians, more effective health services and products and a strengthened Canadian health care system. Composed of 13 institutes, CIHR provides leadership and support to more than 8,000 researchers and research teams in every province of Canada.
CIHR's Institute of Population and Public Health (IPPH) supports research into the complex interactions (biological, social, cultural, environmental) which determine the health of individuals, communities, and global populations; and into the application of that knowledge to improve the health of both populations and individuals.
The Lung Association is a registered charity that provides information, support programs, funding for medical research and advocates on behalf of people with lung disease in order to improve lung health. We provide information and programs in disease areas such as: asthma, chronic lung disease, tobacco control, sleep apnea, lung cancer, infectious diseases and air quality in relation to effects on lung health. For more information please see the web site or call 1-888-566-5864 (LUNG).
Established in Québec since 1980, the Institut de recherche Robert-Sauvé en santé et en sécurité du travail (IRSST) is a scientific research organization known for the quality of its work and the expertise of its personnel. First Institute of this kind in Canada, the IRSST contributes through research, to the prevention of industrial accidents and occupational diseases as well as to the rehabilitation of affected workers.
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Attachments:
Grant Allocation Chart
Backgrounder
Further Information:
Janet Weichel,
CIHR,
Communications,
(613) 941-4563
Adèle Blanchard,
Office of the Honourable Ujjal Dosanjh,
(613) 957-0200
Mary-Pat Shaw,
Canadian Lung Association,
(613) 569-6411 ext. 227
Jacques Millette,
IRSST,
Communications,
(514) 288-1551
