New Report Provides High-Impact Recommendations to Improve Prevention Policies in America

From the 29 January 2013 Trust for America’s Health news release 

Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) has released A Healthier America 2013: Strategies to Move from Sick Care to Health Care in Four Years – which provides high-impact recommendations to prioritize prevention and improve the health of Americans.

The Healthier America report outlines top policy approaches to respond to studies that show 1) more than half of Americans are living with one or more serious, chronic diseases, a majority of which could have been prevented, and 2) that today’s children could be on track to be the first in U.S. history to live shorter, less healthy lives than their parents.

“America’s health faces two possible futures,” said Gail Christopher, DN, President of the Board of TFAH and Vice President – Program Strategy of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.  “We can continue on the current path, resigning millions of Americans to health problems that could have been avoided or we invest in giving all Americans the opportunity to be healthier while saving billions in health care costs.  We owe it to our children to take the smarter way.”

The Healthier America report stresses the importance of taking innovative approaches and building partnerships with a wide range of sectors in order to be effective.  Some recommendations include:

• Advance the nation’s public health system by adopting a set of foundational capabilities, restructuring federal public health programs and ensuring sufficient, sustained funding to meet these defined foundational capabilities;
• Ensure insurance providers reimburse for effective prevention approaches both inside and outside the doctor’s office;
• Integrate community-based strategies into new health care models, such as by expanding Accountable Care Organizations into Accountable Care Communities;
• Work with nonprofit hospitals to identify the most effective ways they can expand support for prevention through community benefit programs;
• Maintain the Prevention and Public Health Fund and expand the Community Transformation Grant program so all Americans can benefit;
• Implement all of the recommendations for each of the 17 federal agency partners in the National Prevention Strategy; and
• Encourage all employers, including federal, state and local governments, to provide effective, evidence-based workplace wellness programs…..

Related articles

• New Report from HSC and Trust for America’s Health Calls for Federal Action to Close Achievement Gap by Addressing School Health (healthyschoolscampaign.typepad.com)
• Prevention urged to avoid a national health catastrophe (bizbeatblog.dallasnews.com)
• Comment: Take prevention seriously, make it a priority (timescolonist.com)
• Today’s children to live shorter lives (upi.com)

Policy Changes For A Healthier America

 

From the 30 January 2013 article at Medical News Today

Some key policy changes that need to be made in the United States in order to prevent illness and improve the health of millions of Americans have just been outlined in the Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) latest Healthier Americareport.*** 

The report includes a range of suggestions that focus on the prevention of chronic diseases, which currently affect more than half of the U.S. population. This would also help address the health problems facing today’s youth who are set to be the first generation that are less healthy than their parents. …

…

The recommendations involve some new and innovative approaches:

• Implementing a series of foundational capabilities to improve the country’s health system as well as restructuring public health programs with sustained funding.
• Establishing partnerships with nonprofit hospitals to develop new community benefit programs and expand support for prevention.
• Encourage that insurance providers compensate for all types of prevention strategies
• Ensuring that the Prevention and Public Health Fund continues and improve awareness of the Community Transformation Grant program.
• Maintain workplace wellness programs with employers as well as local and state governments.

 

…

The report also includes information about recommendations that are already in action:

• The Accountable Care Community (ACC) brought more than 70 different partners to help patients with type 2 diabetes in and out of the doctor’s office. The ACC managed to reduce the cost of care by more than 10 percent per month for patients with type 2 diabetes – meaning savings of around $3,185 per person yearly.
• The Boston Children’s Hospital implemented The Community Asthma Initiative (CAI) with the purpose of supporting children with asthma in the Boston area. The initiative helped reduce hospital admissions due to asthma-related causes by around 80 percent as well as reducing emergency visits due to asthma by 60 percent.

The report concludes that there are 10 main public health issues that need addressing:

• obesity
• tobacco use
• healthy aging
• improving the health of minorities
• healthy babies
• environment health threats
• injury prevention
• controlling infectious diseases
• food safety
• bioterrorism

Read the entire article here

 

***The report summary and link to the full text of the report may be found here

 

 

Related articles

• Prevention urged to avoid a national health catastrophe (bizbeatblog.dallasnews.com)
• New Report from HSC and Trust for America’s Health Calls for Federal Action to Close Achievement Gap by Addressing School Health (healthyschoolscampaign.typepad.com)
• Comment: Take prevention seriously, make it a priority (timescolonist.com)
• Insight: Think preventive medicine will save money? Think again. (greatriversofhope.wordpress.com)
• The Seven States Least Prepared for Disaster (247wallst.com)
• Hawaii Rises to Second Healthiest State in Nation (damontucker.com)
• “Walk Across Texas” promotes healthier living (victoriaadvocate.com)
• National Shopping Program Aims To Support A Healthier Hispanic Community (paramuspost.com)
• Wendell Potter: Getting Young People to Work Against Their Own Best Interests: Here’s How It’s Done (huffingtonpost.com)

 

[Report] Protecting the Public from Diseases, Disasters, and Bioterrorism

Mississippi did as well as the best states (7 out of 10). My state, Ohio, had a 6 out of 10 as did Massachusetts.

 

An excerpt from the December 2012 article at HealthyAmericans.org

The Ready or Not? report provides a snapshot of our nation’s public health emergency preparedness. Its indicators are developed in consultation with leading public health experts based on data from publicly available sources, or information provided by public officials. Some key findings from the report include:

• 29 states cut public health funding from fiscal years (FY) 2010-11 to 2011-12, with 23 of these states cutting funds for a second year in a row and 14 for three consecutive years. In addition, federal funds for state and local preparedness have decreased 38 percent from FY 2005-2012 (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) funds, adjusted for inflation). States are reporting that gains in public health preparedness achieved in the past decade since September 11, 2001 are eroding, and since 2008, budget cuts have resulted in more than 45,700 job losses at state and local health departments;
• Only two states have met the national goal of vaccinating 90 percent of young children, ages 19-36 months, against whooping cough (pertussis). This year Washington state has seen one of the most significant whooping cough outbreaks in recent history;
• 35 states and Washington, D.C. do not currently have complete climate change adaptation plans, which include planning for health threats posed by extreme weather events;
• 20 states do not mandate all licensed child care facilities to have a multi-hazard written evacuation plan; and
• 13 state public health laboratories report they do not have sufficient capacity to work five, 12-hour days for six to eight weeks in response to an infectious disease outbreak, such as novel influenza A H1N1.

“Public health preparedness has improved leaps and bounds from where we were 10 years ago,” said Paul Kuehnert, MS RN Director of the Public Health Team at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. “But severe budget cuts at the federal, state and local levels threaten to undermine that progress. We must establish a baseline of ‘better safe than sorry’ preparedness that should not be crossed.”

The Ready or Not? report provides a series of recommendations that address many of the major gaps in emergency health preparedness, including:

• Reauthorize the Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Act (PAHPA), which expires at the end of this year;
• Assure sufficient, dedicated funds for public health preparedness to ensure basic capabilities to respond to threats public health departments face every day and also to have the trained experts and systems in place to act quickly in the face of major, unexpected emergencies;
• Provide ongoing support to communities so they better cope and recover from emergencies;
• Modernize biosurveillance to a real-time, interoperable system to better detect and respond to problems;
• Seriously address antibiotic resistance;
• Improve research, development and manufacturing of medical countermeasures;
• Increase readiness for extreme weather events; and
• Update the nation’s food safety system.

The report was supported by a grant from RWJF and is available on TFAH’s website atwww.healthyamericans.org and RWJF’s website at www.rwjf.org.

Related articles

• Come plague, storm or bomb, most U.S. states unprepared: report (prn.fm)
• Report shows Montana scores poorly on health emergency preparedness (billingsgazette.com)
• The Seven States Least Prepared for Disaster (247wallst.com)
• States Show Improvements, But Remain Unprepared for Public Health Emergencies (healthland.time.com)
• Mississippi ranked in top five for emergency preparedness. (mississippipep.wordpress.com)
• What States are Ready for the Apocalypse? (washingtonian.com)
• Federal Safe Routes to School program reduces child injuries by more than 40 percent in New York City (eurekalert.org)

The Compelling Need for Game-Changing Influenza Vaccines: An Analysis of the Influenza Vaccine Enterprise and Recommendations for the Future

English: This is CDC Clinic Chief Nurse Lee Ann Jean-Louis extracting Influenza Virus Vaccine, Fluzone® from a 5 ml. vial. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

From the 11 December 2012 summary at Full Text Reports

 

….The ongoing public health burden caused by seasonal influenza and the potential global effect of a severe pandemic create an urgent need for a new generation of highly effective and cross-protective vaccines that can be manufactured rapidly. A universal vaccine should be the goal, with a novel-antigen game-changing vaccine the minimum requirement…

 

Related articles

• Ontology-Based Combinatorial Comparative Analysis of Adverse Events Associated with Killed and Live Influenza Vaccines (plosone.org)
• “We Have Overpromoted And Overhyped This [Influenza] Vaccine” (biosurveillance.typepad.com)
• Report Casts Doubt over Success of Flu Vaccine (theepochtimes.com)
• OSHA rejects mandatory flu vaccines for health care workers (therefusers.com)
• Why a Reluctance to Health? (appliedepidemiology.wordpress.com)
• Stronger Influenza Vaccines Needed (passporthealthsarasota-bradenton.com)
• U.S. Flu Season Off To Early Start, CDC Urges Vaccination (cdc.gov)

 

The Future of Veterinary Public Health

 

From the 24 October 2012 post at The Vector- A Student Blog on Veterinary Public Health

The Future of Veterinary Public Health will be

Challenging

Since 60-70% of all emerging diseases are zoonotic, there will be plenty of work to go around for veterinarians, physicians and allied health professionals!  Diseases that we should be particularly careful about are respiratory diseases with easy airborne transmission.  Recent examples of diseases that circulated in animals and then jumped species to humans and then easily spread among humans are SARS and some influenzas such as H1N1 (pigs are origin) & H5N1 (birds are a source)….

…

Progressive

Many professionals and pre-professionals in the field of veterinary public health see the future of the discipline becoming more expansive and comprehensive.  They predict that more veterinarians will turn to public health practice and that veterinary medicine will take a more prominent role in the field of public health.  Currently at Ohio State, an example of progress in bridging the gap between veterinary medicine and human medicine is Dr. Armando Hoet’s research, which adds to the knowledge base of Methicillin-Resistant Staphylococcus aureas (MRSA) by demonstrating how animals and human-animal interactions can contribute to the spread of MRSA.

Intriguing

New terms like Zoobiquity (or Zoob for short) describing the One Health concept may feel awkward at first, but we’ll find our groove.  We just have to remind or teach ourselves and our colleagues that animals and humans have coexisted for thousands of years, sharing germs and interacting on equal and unequal terms.  We may look starkly different on the outside, but we have a shared biology and our medicines should reflect that similarity.

 

 

 

[Reblog] Children of Our Fields

An insightful article about the high health risks associated with farm workers.
Something to ponder when thinking about and discussing who has a “right” to health care.
education, and a fair wage.

 

 

From the 1November post by Amy Croan, MPH at To Your Health

trackback

Every time we sit at a table at night or in the morning to enjoy the fruits and grain and vegetables from our good earth, remember that they come from the work of men and women and children who have been exploited for generations. -Cesar Chavez

Of the three to five million U.S. migrant and legal immigrant workers, about 600,000 of them are children. It’s difficult to ascertain an accurate count, because they are under-reported.

Most industries allow minors to work from the age of 16, but for agriculture the minimum age drops to 12. The migrant field worker families often have several children whom each year they uproot from their homes and schools to travel sometimes many states away, to work in endless fields 10-14 hours per day from the age of 12. Sometimes as young as 7 because there is no childcare. And they do this because they feel they have no other choice.

From today’s Latin American Herald Times,

North Carolina’s regional coordinator of Association of Farmworker Opportunity Programs, Emily Drakage’s, mission is to document the amount of child labor in the agricultural sector, educate the public and local leaders about the conditions in which the children work and seek support from other organizations to get these minors out of the fields.

“It’s a very tough problem. There are cultural and linguistic barriers, economic interests, immigration, educational and health problems, but someone has to speak for these workers who have no voice and are unaware of their rights,” Drakage said.

Farm workers earn an average of just $7,000 a year and must pay part of their salary to their employer to cover transport and housing costs. Children earn $1,000 a year.

Usual migrant housing is filthy, rusted and cramped. Poverty levels are extremely high. Little to no access to health care is common. Health insurance is unheard of. One hundred thousand children are injured by sharp blades and other farm machinery each year.

Farmworkers are among the highest risk groups for:

• Poverty–among 97% of migrant workers
• Lack of basic education, literacy and language skills, job training
• Poor health: respiratory and dermatological illnesses, dehydration, heat stroke and heat illness, chronic muscular and skeletal pain, direct exposure to sanitation chemicals and pesticides, infectious disease, chronic disease, work-related injuries, depression and substance abuse, lack of sanitation
• Death
• Sexual abuse
• Gang activity
• Marginalization
• Slave wages and wage fraud
• Failure to thrive under provisions of the Fair Labor Standards Act and child labor laws

In 1960, Edward R. Murrow’s “Harvest of Shame” aired the day after Thanksgiving. Fifty years later, CBS News revisits the very topic and details again the deplorable working conditions of the migrant family.
Feeling grateful this month as you prepare the bounty for your Thanksgiving table? In a nation where 2/3 of adults and 1/3 of children are overweight or obese from making poor choices about food, one-fifth of our farm workforce is children. These workers drive the agricultural sector and provide fresh food the millions of the rest of us enjoy everyday.

Related Reading:

Itinerant LIfe Weighs on Farmworkers’ Children (www.nytimes.com)

NOW With Bill Moyers  (www.pbs.org)

Shame On Obama Administration For Sacrificing Children to Keep Agribusiness Happy (www.citizen.org)

United Farm Workers (www.ufw.org)

Related articles

• Pesticide Threat Looms Large Over Farmworker Families (my.firedoglake.com)
• Child farm labor in Oregon and the US: big dangers, little change (oregonlive.com)
• Fair Trade Comes Home (counterpunch.org)
• US: Pesticide Threat Looms Large Over Farmworker Families (revolutionaryfrontlines.wordpress.com)
• farmworker wage theft (thegreenhorns.wordpress.com)
• Occupational Health News Roundup [The Pump Handle] (scienceblogs.com)

 

UN Publishes Atlas Of Health And Climate

From the 28 October 2012 WHO news release

 As the world’s climate continues to change, hazards to human health are increasing. The Atlas of health and climate, published today jointly by WHO and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), illustrates some of the most pressing current and emerging challenges.

Droughts, floods and cyclones affect the health of millions of people each year. Climate variability and extreme conditions such as floods can also trigger epidemics of diseases such as diarrhoea, malaria, dengue and meningitis, which cause death and suffering for many millions more. The Atlas gives practical examples of how the use of weather and climate information can protect public health.

Climate risk management

“Prevention and preparedness are the heart of public health. Risk management is our daily bread and butter. Information on climate variability and climate change is a powerful scientific tool that assists us in these tasks,” said Dr Margaret Chan, Director-General of WHO. “Climate has a profound impact on the lives, and survival, of people. Climate services can have a profound impact on improving these lives, also through better health outcomes.”

Until now, climate services have been an underutilized resource for public health.

“Stronger cooperation between the meteorological and health communities is essential to ensure that up-to-date, accurate and relevant information on weather and climate is integrated into public health management at international, national and local levels. This Atlas is an innovative and practical example of how we can work together to serve society,” said WMO Secretary-General Mr Michel Jarraud.

Links between health and climate

Numerous maps, tables and graphs assembled in the Atlas make the links between health and climate more explicit:

• In some locations the incidence of infectious diseases such as malaria, dengue, meningitis and cholera can vary by factors of more than 100 between seasons, and significantly between years, depending on weather and climate conditions. Stronger climate services in endemic countries can help predict the onset, intensity and duration of epidemics.
• Case studies illustrate how collaboration between meteorological, emergency and health services is already saving lives. For example, the death toll from cyclones of similar intensity in Bangladesh reduced from around 500 000 in 1970, to 140 000 in 1991, to 3 000 in 2007 – largely thanks to improved early warning systems and preparedness.
• Heat extremes that would currently be expected to occur only once in 20 years, may occur on average every 2-5 years by the middle of this century. At the same time, the number of older people living in cities (one of the most vulnerable groups to heat stress), will almost quadruple globally, from 380 million in 2010, to 1.4 billion in 2050. Cooperation between health and climate services can trigger measures to better protect people during periods of extreme weather.
• Shifting to clean household energy sources would both reduce climate change, and save the lives of approximately 680 000 children a year from reduced air pollution. The Atlas also shows how meteorological and health services can collaborate to monitor air pollution and its health impacts.
• In addition, the unique tool shows how the relationship between health and climate is shaped by other vulnerabilities, such as those created by poverty, environmental degradation, and poor infrastructure, especially for water and sanitation.

 

 

Related articles

• U.N. health “Atlas” may help predict outbreaks (cbsnews.com)
• WMO, WHO call for better use of climate services for public health (nzweek.com)
• UN pinpoints climate-linked health risks (capitalfm.co.ke)

[Reblog] Keepin’ It Real (with Real Food) …October 24 is Food Day

English: Loma Linda University Vegetarian Food Pyramid (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

[Reblog] 

 

Posted by acroanmph in Public Health.
Tags: Diet, Disease, Farms, Food, Nutrition, Public health, Sustainable Food
trackback

 

Wednesday, October 24 is Food Day. Join in this second annual national event where thousands of businesses, coalitions and other participants are holding Food Day celebrations to promote healthy, affordable and sustainable food. 

 

 

Created by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, Food Day has become a movement to increase awareness of the usual unhealthy American diet which is leading to our top three causes of death and other forms of morbidity.

 

Our nation’s food system is not focused on promoting health, but maintaining agribusiness and food production as cheaply as possible. Fellow blogger, Ellice Campbell of Enlightened Lotus Wellness, just published a worthwhile post, Corn And It’s Stranglehold on the Food Industry. Also, have a look at The Trouble With Corn Subsidies. About 75% of all grocery store food products contain some form of corn (not the sweet kind that we enjoy during the summer) and high fructose corn syrup. This is creating a sugar addiction among our children and is one factor contributing to increased diagnoses of diabetes in adults and children, not to mention obesity. I find this to be an outrage.

 

What we put into our bodies is 100% up to us! Just because cheap and processed foods are available everywhere we look, does not mean we must succumb to eating them. As one of my blog readers previously commented, “Eat what you want–no one is forcing you not to.” Every time we eat and every thing we eat is completely our choice. I feel this is too fundamental to even blog about, but as a nation, we are clearly not making the best choices.

 

Of course this has implications beyond personal diet and disease. According to CSPI, only minor amounts of Farm Bill funding support organic and sustainable farms, while the unhealthiest farm producers reap the major funds. We have allowed our government to carry on this way for decades. Food production methods are harmful to workers, animals and the environment.

 

How will you celebrate Food Day? Click the link for inspiration, activities, recipes and a zip code map to see what is offered in your area. Or, take a page from their school curriculum, eat real around your dinner table and discuss healthy eating and where your food comes from.

 

Eat Real, y’all. Practice mindful eating and the world will be better off. Really.

 

Related articles

 

• Is The Food Pyramid Killing Us? (acroan.com)
• New Online Tool Addresses Consumer Questions On Food Production(prnewswire.com)
• Autism Linked to High-Fructose Corn Syrup (wakingtimes.com)
• What’s at Stake with the Farm Bill in Limbo? (article-3.com)
• For Food Day, celebrate a new awareness of nutrition (usatoday.com)

 

More Related articles

 

• High Fructose Corn Syrup: Is It Really Dangerous? (networkingforwealth.wordpress.com)
• Corn and it’s Stranglehold on the Food Industry (enlightenedlotuswellness.com)
• Surprising Products That Contain High Fructose Corn Syrup (mysonhatescornsyrup.com)
• How sugar may be making you fat… and stupid (metronews.ca)
• Hidden Dangers: Foods with High Fructose Corn Syrup (naturalsociety.com)

 

 

From a recent CAPHIS** listserv item

As part of a project funded by the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and
Refugee Rights (ICIRR) and the State of Illinois, Department of Human
Services, a number of multilingual educational materials are being
developed.

They cover nutrition and health during and after pregnancy,
as well as during infancy and early childhood. These resources may be
especially helpful for WIC programs who serve refugee populations. These
free materials are available as web-videos and audio files in English,
Nepali and Burmese. Arabic and Bhutanese versions are under
development. Written handouts for all languages are also under
development.

These new materials can be found under the
Pregnancy/Reproduction and Food/Nutrition topics on the Healthy Roads
Media website – www.healthyroadsmedia.org
As always, any feedback to help guide the development of these kinds 
of resources is very helpful.

 

**CAPHIS (Consumer and Public Health Information Section of the Medical Librarian Association)
has compiled a Top 100 List of Health Websites you can trust.

These lists of resources expand upon the MLA Top Ten List.

General Health Women’s Health Men’s Health

Parenting & Kids Senior Health Specific Health

For Health Professionals Drug Information Resources Other Useful Health Sites

 

[Web site] Count the Costs: 50 Years on the War on Drugs

Stumbled on this Web site today through Facebook.

While I am still a bit wary of legalizing drugs, I am beginning to see substance abuse as more a public health issue rather than a criminal issue.
At the very least,  the current war on drugs needs re-examination.

Count the Costs: 50 Years on the War on Drugs includes related reports in the areas of public health, environment, human rights, crime, and economics.

Related Resource

After the War on Drugs: Blueprint for Regulation

There is a growing recognition around the world that the prohibition of drugs is a counterproductive failure. However, a major barrier to drug law reform has been a widespread fear of the unknown – just what could a post-prohibition regime look like?

For the first time, ‘After the War on Drugs: Blueprint for Regulation’ answers that question by proposing specific models of regulation for each main type and preparation of prohibited drug, coupled with the principles and rationale for doing so.There is a growing recognition around the world that the prohibition of drugs is a counterproductive failure. However, a major barrier to drug law reform has been a widespread fear of the unknown – just what could a post-prohibition regime look like?

For the first time, ‘After the War on Drugs: Blueprint for Regulation’ answers that question by proposing specific models of regulation for each main type and preparation of prohibited drug, coupled with the principles and rationale for doing so.

Related articles

• The Mexican Mormon War (Drug Cartels vs. Mormons Full… (geocrises.org)
• War on drugs is an ‘obstacle to black progress’ (current.com)
• Google This: The War On Drugs Has Failed (bigthink.com)
• Eugene Jarecki, Bill Maher Agree: The War On Drugs Is Bullsh*t (VIDEO) (huffingtonpost.com)
• Uruguay takes ‘war on drugs’ in new direction: state monopoly over the production and distribution of marijuana (rawstory.com)
• The War on Drugs was never about Drugs (urbanhorror.wordpress.com)
• U.S.-led “war on drugs” questioned at U.N. (themoderatevoice.com)
• Colombia, Guatemala, and Mexico Beg for an End to the Murderous War on Drugs (alternet.org)
• Grisly War on Drugs fact of the day (aei-ideas.org)