The CLOTHO Lab embraces the importance of research translation into policy or tangible societal impact associated with our efforts towards disease prevention or control. To this extent, our lab has been putting forward evidence-based research translation efforts by bringing exposome research closer to stakeholders, ranging from policy makers in Cyprus and Europe, to parents, to teachers, to private sector, to patients.

Case Study: Every school on this planet should aim to become a healthy school. This is the motto of the WHO/UNICEF health-promoting school (HPS) strategic agenda.

A total of 30 experts engaged in a multi-stakeholder consultation involving academics, governmental officials, teacher liaisons, and health professionals, including experts from the World Health Organization (WHO) Athens Quality of Care and Patient Safety Office and from the WHO Headquarters and the WHO Office in Cyprus, as well as experts from European academia and national and international NGOs.

The multi-stakeholder consultation identified major challenges for the WHO HPS agenda, which were thematically grouped into five categories: 1) systemic limitations in funding and sustainability of health education and promotion programs; 2) curriculum gaps in health literacy; 3) limitations in the school physical environment; 4) rise in behavioral risk factors among children and adolescents; and 5) increasing mental health needs. The participants collectively proposed addressing these challenges through the implementation of holistic methodological frameworks, such as the Human Exposome paradigm and its exposomics tools.