The Settings Approach in Public Health: Thinking about Schools in Infectious Disease Prevention and Control

The purpose of this Purple Paper is to consider the settings approach to health promotion in schools, specifically with respect to infectious disease, and to stimulate considerations for the development of a framework to further advance partnerships and collaboration between public health and the education sector in Canada.

The Settings Approach in Public Health: Thinking about Schools in Infectious Disease Prevention and Control

1. Introduction School is a place where children learn and develop the life skills to function and thrive. Schools are thus one of the most important settings for children’s physical, emotional and intellectual growth. Given that most children spend so much time in schools, they are also an important setting for public health interventions and…

Is School Closure an Effective Strategy to Control Influenza? Summary Version

Closing schools seems like a logical approach to managing community outbreaks of influenza. In practice, however, the effectiveness of school closures for managing outbreaks or severe outcomes related to influenza is unclear. Research on school closures has sometimes lacked rigour, often led to contradictory findings, or been insufficient to answer some of the more important questions.