For decades, advocates have been spinning their wheels trying to reduce health disparities. Health-care is a necessary but insufficient weapon in this battle, leading many to pursue environmental or place-based approaches to promoting health such as increasing access to healthy foods, improving air quality, and contributing to land use planning.

Now, lawyers across the country are joining this pursuit. A Boston hospital is using lawyers to demand accountability and fight for healthier living conditions for poor families. In Los Angeles, organizers are helping tenants living in unhealthy housing find legal counsel and press landlords to improve their rental properties. Strategies such as these are gaining traction and have been shown to reduce illness as well as time spent in a clinic or hospital for those who can least afford to be there.

Check out the embed player below for a recent story on Marketplace about the practice:

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Below is an excerpt from a post I wrote for the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Commission to Build a Healthier America Leadership Blog. To read the full post, click here.

The type of community we live in clearly has a tremendous impact on our health. That is why I am so excited and inspired to be a part of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Commission to Build a Healthier America. By shining a light on the way our economic, social, and physical environments affect our health, the commission is helping to expand our national discussion on health beyond just health care.

Those key environmental effects are never more clear than in the neighborhoods loaded with unhealthier food options. In an era when we are acutely aware of the effect of our diets on our overall health, we are leaving millions of Americans adrift in neighborhoods where healthy eating is next to impossible. For many people, food “choices” are really nothing of the sort. People must first have a broad and healthy set of food options in order to be able to make healthy choices.

To learn more about the Commission and its mission, visit www.CommissionOnHealth.org

The Delaware News-Journal has an interesting op-ed today about the impact of the built environment on our health. Written by two leaders at Nemours Health and Prevention Services, the piece looks at how better community planning, more park space, and easier access to healthy food stores can help families craft a truly healthy lifestyle.

Remember a time when you walked to school? Or played with friends outside for hours after dinner?

Maybe you even stayed outside for awhile after it got dark just to squeeze in a few more minutes of shooting hoops, playing catch or riding your bike.

Today, many of our kids do not have this experience.

Many factors in our communities prevent them from being active outside. Traffic, neighborhood safety concerns, and the lack of nearby parks or playgrounds are just a few.

For more information and resources on how to make your community more healthy, please visit the PolicyLink Center for Health and Place.