Why is there a need for Healthy Cities Across the Middle East?
By Dr Sangeeta Singh, a Consultant at WISH.
Across the Middle East, cities are working to turn big visions into healthier daily lives, safer streets, greener neighbourhoods, cleaner air, and more active routines. However, ambition alone isn’t enough. Success depends on practical plans that coordinate health, urban planning, transportation, and climate action, and then measure what truly matters. In this blog I attempt to summarise findings from a recent review of “healthy city” efforts across the region. It highlights what works, where gaps exist, and how policymakers can accelerate progress without losing sight of culture, equity, or evidence.
Gulf cities invest heavily in resources, smart-city technologies, and large infrastructure projects. These are practical tools when combined with community engagement and clear health objectives. The literature shows that while economic capacity and digital tools can advance quickly, their impact is most significant when residents are involved early in setting priorities and policies.
Sustainable, healthy cities in the region rely consistently on community participation and cultural awareness, such as formal volunteer networks, civil society involvement, and gender-sensitive planning. When cities incorporate local norms (for example, designing for heat, faith, and extended families), programs become more effective and resilient.
Green infrastructure, urban forests, and flood-management landscapes enhance climate resilience and offer mental health and equity benefits. Likewise, safe walking and cycling routes, especially when aligned with transportation and health policies, encourage physical activity and lower the risk of chronic diseases.
A common obstacle is unclear roles across health, urban planning, and transport. Without a formal “backbone” organisation to oversee Health in All Policies (HiAP), initiatives either stall or get duplicated. Cities need a permanent coordination body with the authority to establish shared goals and promote progress.
Many programs lack baseline data, standardised indicators, or routine monitoring. Without measurable targets, especially disaggregated by gender, age, and neighbourhood, leaders cannot demonstrate value or adjust course. Accountability systems are as vital as parks and paths.
Digital platforms can enhance citizen reporting and informed decision-making, but only if there are safeguards for privacy, data quality, and equitable access. Building capacity for municipal teams is essential.
What Works: A Practical Roadmap for City Leaders
1) Create a formal “Healthy City Coordination Council”
Integrate health, transportation, urban planning, environment, and finance into a unified governance structure that convenes regularly, sets city-wide health objectives, and reports publicly. This creates the foundation for HiAP and sustained political support.
2) Standardise indicators and publish a dashboard
Establish a core set of metrics—physical activity, walkability, heat exposure, air quality, green access, and injury rates —disaggregated by equity. Develop a routine monitoring cycle aligned with SDGs and publish quarterly dashboards to sustain progress.
3) Scale proven interventions first
Prioritise active transportation by adding connected sidewalks, shade, and safe crossings, along with nature-based solutions like parks, wadis, and urban forests, to ensure access to daily needs within a 15-minute radius. Use scenario modelling to identify where investments will yield the most significant health benefits.
4) Leverage tech responsibly
Implement citizen-feedback apps and Internet of Things (IoT) monitoring with strong governance: establish data ownership, privacy policies, and leadership analysis and response capabilities. Start small, improve, and share lessons learned.
5) Fund for durability
Healthy city initiatives decline without steady funding. Combine multisectoral budgets, health funds, development finance, and value capture from land improvements. Assess return on investment to sustain programs through political cycles.
This summary highlights promising directions across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and non-GCC regions. In Saudi cities advancing within WHO/EMRO’s Healthy Cities network, the value of national alignment (e.g., Vision 2030) and strong volunteer networks is evident. Qatar, for example, is advancing healthy ageing through a coordinated, person-centred model: it has adapted WHO’s Integrated Care for Older People (ICOPE) screening tool to local needs and embedded it in a national data system accessible across primary, secondary and tertiary care; trained multidisciplinary teams and physicians to run community ICOPE clinics; linked audiology and ophthalmology for routine screening; and complemented this with a National Dementia Plan, Age-Friendly Health Systems work with the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, and a WHO Collaborating Centre for Healthy Ageing and Dementia. In other areas, such as Jordan, Lebanon and Oman, community-based approaches and international partnerships have shown potential for targeted successes, especially when walkability standards and measurable goals are strengthened.
Practical, healthy-city efforts succeed when they shift from discrete “projects” to a living system that listens to residents, measures what truly matters, and continuously adapts. The Middle East has unique strengths for this challenge: the ability to mobilise quickly, design for extreme climates, and leverage a strong social fabric. The next step is governance: formalising cross-sector leadership and integrating data use so that every park, path and policy is accountable for health. Cities that follow this approach can turn vision into daily wellbeing more quickly and more equitably.
Effective city roadmaps in the Middle East emphasise: (1) formalising cross-sector coordination, (2) standardising indicators and publishing dashboards, (3) expanding proven mobility and nature-based solutions, (4) governing technology responsibly, and (5) securing sustainable funding. City leaders, health agencies, planners and community organisations each have a role—and a shared scorecard—to meet these objectives.
Author bio
Dr Sangeeta Singh is a Consultant at WISH, focusing on urban health, systems governance, and measurement. She works with city leaders, policy makers, academia, and health agencies to design evidence-based, people-cantered healthy city roadmaps.
