Vivian Lin is Adjunct Professor of Public Health at La Trobe University and Honorary Professor at LKS Faculty of Medicine, University of Hong Kong (HKU). She was Executive Associate Dean and Professor of Public Health at HKU from 2019 to 2024, Director of Health Systems at the Regional Office for the Western Pacific of the World Health Organization from 2013 to 2018, and previously Chair of Public Health at La Trobe.James Smith has been a community-based public health practitioner and risk management consultant for over 40 years. This has involved him working actively alongside and supporting practitioners in health protection and applied environmental health service delivery and planning, and in public health emergency management preparedness and response planning. He is Professor, Environmental Health (Practice) in the College of Science & Engineering, Flinders University, where he teaches in the postgraduate environmental health program and researches public health regulatory policy, local state public health policy implementation, and environmental health practice.Sally Fawkes is Independent Consultant and Researcher in public health fields spanning foresight/futures studies, urban health and healthy cities, health promoting, health systems and services, and leadership development. She has been a technical advisor/consultant to the World Health Organization (WHO) since 1995. She held academic leadership and teaching roles at La Trobe University from 2010 to 2021 before taking up a Adjunct Senior Academic role. Governance appointments have included Deputy Chair, Victorian Health Promotion Foundation Board, and Vice Chair, International Network of Health Promoting Hospitals and Health Services Governance Board.

• Introduction. Part I Background: The basics. 1.What is public health? Definitions and applications. 2.The historical development of public health: Landmarks in the field. 3.Health and wellbeing in Australia today: Health status, the healthcare system, and the place of public health. Part II Conceptual and analytical toolkit: key concepts and frameworks. 4.Distribution of health and its determinants: Changing concepts and models. 5.Explaining differences and determinants: environment, society, and behaviour. 6.Public health interventions: From quarantine to the rise of ‘evidence-based practice’. 7.Health systems and policy: Making sense of the complex mosaic. 8.Ethical foundations for public health practice. Part III Public health infrastructure: building blocks and the system of delivery. 9.Who delivers public health? Contemporary policies and players. 10.Legislative authority for public health action: How governments and societal expectations intersect. 11.Public health intelligence: Its production and use for action. 12.Human and financial resources: Essential foundations for action. Part IV Public health action: Key interventions from past to present. 13.Disease control: from surveillance to interventions. 14.Health protection: From the physical environment to ecological health. 15.Preventive services: Linking public health and personal health care. 16.Health promotion: From lifestyles to societal, commercial, and environmental determinants of health. 17.Health maintenance and improvement for vulnerable populations: From needs to rights. Part V Public health challenges: Emerging issues and responses18.Public health governance: Politics of participation, decision-making, and accountability. 19.Futures of public health: Where to now for the organised effort?