WHO's Health Economic Assessment Tool (HEAT) helps assessing the health benefits of public bicycle sharing scheme in Barcelona, Spain

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Bicing is a public bicycle sharing scheme in Barcelona, Spain, with about 182,000 subscribers. A health impact assessment study estimated the risks and benefits to health of travel by bicycle compared with travel by car in an urban environment. Results show that the public bicycle scheme brings benefits to health by increasing the levels of physical activity, and also through reducing carbon dioxide emission.

The study used WHO guidance and HEAT, the Health Economic Assessment Tool, to estimate the health benefits of cycling.