This article is a literature review of the letters and declarations about the strategy of health promotion, since the Ottawa letter of 1986. Its objective is search for a historical restoration of their currents and conceptions in order to offer subsidies for understanding the present reality. This article concludes that the Ottawa letter continues to remain a central piece of direction for the health promotion strategy all over the world. It has oriented other conferences, principally when they emphasize social dimensions and the importance of five essential strategies for achieving full health: public policies, healthy environments, reinforcement of communitarian action, creation of personal abilities, and reorientation of health services.
Public health; Health service; History