What evidence is being used to inform municipal strategic planning for health and wellbeing? Victoria, Australia, a case study

Victorian local governments (LGs) are required to develop evidence-based Municipal Public Health and Wellbeing Plans (MPHWPs) that improve health and wellbeing. This study evaluated the implementation of this requirement across 79 LGs. Evidence in 116 documents was categorised by source, issue, and policy specificity. Over 11,000 evidence-occurrences from 200 sources were recorded. More evidence on social determinants was identified than on epidemiology or health behaviours. Most (96%) evidence was descriptive and only 4% supported MPHWP actions. The results suggest the community is an important source of novel interventions, and proposes three related reasons for the dearth of intervention level evidence.