January 25, 2005
Council on Linkages
Thanks to Hugh Tilson for representing ACPM at
the quarterly meeting of the Council on Linkages Between
Academia and Public Health Practice (COL). The COL
meeting focused on the public health workforce crisis
and, specifically, addressed recruitment and retention
strategies to solve this national dilemma. The council
first heard a series of presentations on lessons learned
from the field of education and from state
government. Council members then broke up into groups
to discuss strategies for the public health profession.
January 13, 2005
Bioterrorism Briefing
ACPM staff attended the briefing titled “Breathing
Easier?”, a report of The Century Foundation Working
Group on Bioterrorism Preparedness. The report examined
how states and cities were using the increased public
health funding appropriated to state and local
governments after the anthrax attacks of fall 2001 in
order to enhance preparedness for responding to such
emergencies. While it was determined that though the
funding has resulted in considerable improvements to the
U.S. public health system, substantial vulnerabilities
still remain. They also came to the conclusion that
many issues remain to be addressed in order to sustain
and improve the public health system to respond
effectively to a future bioterrorism attack.
January 12, 2005
Surgeon General’s
Workshop on Healthy Indoor Environment
ACPM staff attended the first day of the workshop. The
main focus of the workshop was to “enhance the
understanding of the public health consequences of the
non-industrial indoor environment and to provide
guidance to the Surgeon General and the public health
community in promoting public health in these
settings.” The Surgeon General addressed the group
himself and stated that it was imperative that we
”promote health literacy in a health illiterate
society.” The overarching conclusion at the end was
that there was a need to advance the accumulation and
dissemination of IEQ (Indoor Environment Quality)
knowledge.
January 12, 2005
Title VII Health
Professions Reauthorization
Thanks to
Miriam Alexander,
Director of the General Preventive Medicine Residency
Program at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public
Health, for representing ACPM on the Professional
Societies panel convened by the Association of American
Medical Colleges’ Title VII Reauthorization Committee.
The Committee, made up primarily of Presidents and Deans
of medical schools, is drafting recommendations to
submit to the Congress and Administration regarding the
Title VII reauthorization bill. Title VII provides
funds for the development of the health professions
workforce, including preventive medicine residency
training programs, with an emphasis on improving care
for underserved populations. Dr. Alexander testified to
the importance of the preventive medicine workforce to
the nation’s health care system, the importance of Title
VII funding to growing that workforce, and the need to
strengthen the performance measurement and
accountability systems within Title VII to demonstrate
success to policy makers.
January 6,
2005
Childhood Overweight
Thanks to Doug Kamerow for reviewing on behalf of
the College the draft Recommendation Statement,
“Screening for Childhood Overweight,” developed by the
United States Preventive Services Task Force. Currently,
Dr. Kamerow is Chief Scientist, Health, Social and
Economics Research, at RTI International. Dr. Kamerow is
also a member of IOM's Committee on Prevention of
Obesity in Children and Youth which recently produced
the landmark report, "Preventing Childhood Obesity,
Health in the Balance."
