http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/ en info@communityhealthpriorities.org Copyright 2010 2010-03-15T22:36:07+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/poll_community_health_priority/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/poll_community_health_priority/ We know it’s hard, but if you had to choose just one issue to get additional funding, which would it be? The bottom line is that we’re trying to determine where you feel the greatest needs are right now. What is the most important public health issue in your community?  (  polls) Polls 2008-06-05T11:43:31+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/oral_health_funding/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/oral_health_funding/ Our friends at the Oregon Community Foundation asked us to share with CHP readers a new funding opportunity for Benton, Douglas, Lane, and Linn Counties.  Dental disease is an issue that affects many children in Oregon, and often times, could have been prevented. Thirty-five percent of our first and third graders suffer from untreated decay and lose millions of school hours each year. And because untreated decay can lead to abscess, bone destruction, and an infection in the bloodstream, these children’s ability to eat, speak, learn, and play is at risk. Children who have poor oral health are being set up for a lifetime of dental problems if the underlying problems are not addressed. The Oregon Community Foundation launched the Regional Action Initiative (RAI) in 2008 to engage Oregonians in a new level of civic leadership to increase Oregon’s quality of life and improve communities in a significant and lasting way. OCF is contributing a one-time special allocation of $1 million to each of OCF’s seven service regions, including Southern Willamette Valley, to implement and evaluate the RAI. The SWV region includes Benton, Douglas, Lane and Linn Counties. Volunteers from the OCF Southern Willamette Valley Leadership Council formed a RAI Committee that assessed the needs of children and families in the four counties. After multiple interviews, presentations and community forums, they identified children’s dental health as a significant issue to address with this Initiative. For the past six months, community leaders and researchers have helped the Council identify how to make an impact in children’s dental health through education, prevention, treatment and advocacy. While this effort is part of the overall RAI, it will be referred to as the Southern Willamette Valley Children’s Dental Health Initiative. The RAI Committee intends to support efforts over the next three years to improve children’s dental health in the four county region with special emphasis on prevention through education and advocacy. The SWV RAI Committee invites interested applicants to submit proposals demonstrating how one or more of the following desired outcomes could be achieved. To learn more about what types of projects they are looking to support and whether your organization is eligible to receive a grant, download their “Request For Application” and application forms here: Request For Proposals SWV Regional Action Initiative Application Form Applications are due May 14, 2010. Public Health 2010-03-15T22:36:07+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/poll/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/poll/ Northwest Health Foundation, through its Community Health Priorities Project, has just released new public opinion research conducted by Davis Hibbitts Midghall, revealing areas where Oregonians want health dollars spent. Among the findings: • 84 percent support increasing state funds for farm-to-school programs to provide children with healthier meals • 84 percent support more state money to provide physical education in schools • 71 percent want lawmakers to limit tobacco advertising in Oregon • 63 percent would support the government adding fluoride to drinking water “It’s clear Oregonians understand health is about so much more than the health care debate raging nationwide,” said CHP’s David Rebanal. “It is about access to health care, but it’s also about what we can do as a state to make it easier for people to make healthy choices.” View the press release here. View the entire poll results here. What’s your reaction? Surprised? Do you see a disconnect between public opinion and public policy? Before The Legislature, Disparities, Economic Issues, Education, Policies and Laws, Nutrition, Polls, Public Health 2010-03-10T17:00:24+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/is_a_soda_tax_paternalism_victim_blaming/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/is_a_soda_tax_paternalism_victim_blaming/ The CHP Twitter feed recently received a message from @erinashmiller, who tweeted that “taxing junk food violates horizontal & vertical equity, also paternalistic.” The tweet included a link to an article she wrote on agriculture policy wherein she discussed the issue of “fat tax” as violating “horizontal equity.” Soda and junk food tax proposals, she writes, tax prepackaged junk foods, but not equally unhealthy foods consumed by groups in higher income brackets.” This, she says, violates “horizontal equity,” which holds that similarly situated taxpayers should be treated similarly. Taxing foods primarily consumed by one group of people while not taxing foods consumed by another group violates horizontal equity.  For example, imposing a fat tax on foie gras but not cow livers would violate horizontal equity as would a tax on cheez wiz but not brie, or a tax on Coke but not Martinelli’s non-alcoholic pear cider. These taxes are also said to violate “vertical equity,” or the extent to which taxes are fairly levied based on the ability of people to pay. Since junk food is consumed more by lower economic groups, people with the least money would bare the brunt of the increased tax. The tweet and article echo a comment we received from Shane Lorimer on our soda tax poll. Shane wrote that “to artificially increase the price of something we are already artificially reducing the price of, through our farm subsidies for corn crops, is ridiculous. Instead of paying twice for the low cost of soda, why not tax soda companies for purchasing the sugar/corn syrup, or better yet, increase cost of all these nutritionally worthless foods by decreasing the corn subsidies?” “What are we going to do,” Shane asks, “increase the tax on every unhealthy behavior until only the rich can be unhealthy? We need to stop this waste and focus on issues that will really make a meaningful impact and NOT blame the victim.” These points are well made, but agricultural policy and tax policy are not mutually exclusive. Is there anything wrong with ending corn subsidies AND taxing soda AND using the tax money to help reduce obesity in populations most affected by that epidemic? Want to weigh in on this issue? Leave a comment here, or take our soda tax poll. Finally, this just in: New research shows a link between soda taxation and better health. Economic Issues, Editorial Notes, Policies and Laws, Nutrition, Polls, Public Health 2010-03-09T17:53:03+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/citizens/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/citizens/ Is it a simple defense of free speech as protected by the first amendment, or an egregious example of right-wing judicial activism? While that may be one way of framing the recent Supreme Court ruling “Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission,” the question posed here is simply: “Is it a public health issue?” In other words, what might be the public health impact of this ruling? Citizen’s United lead counsel Ted Olson said the decision “overturns some of the most egregiously restrictive aspects of campaign finance law. This is a historic opportunity to strike a blow for the First Amendment.” However, critics of the decision, (which include President Obama) have a different take. Writing in the Huffington Post, Joseph Palermo suggests the ruling will make it even easier for corporations to violate humane conduct, such as “when Cargill uses meat processing subcontractors that spread E. coli across the country, or Nestlé’s rips off Sacramento’s municipal water supply in a time of drought, or ExxonMobil and the energy monopolies flaunt environmental laws and gouge consumers; or the financial services companies bring down the American economy and trade derivatives based on life insurance policies betting that Americans are going to die sooner than later.” Will plastics, pesticide and other manufacturers be able to bring more toxic products to market than they otherwise might have prior to this ruling? Will pharmaceutical companies have greater power to create more perceived needs to fill their medical-industrial pipeline of products? Will it become increasingly difficult to regulate, and even tax, harmful products such as tobacco, soda, and junk food? Will the current state of health disparities in this nation be affected? Is this ruling a public health issue? Air and Water Quality, Disparities, Economic Issues, Policies and Laws, Public Health 2010-03-01T18:28:03+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/countyrank/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/countyrank/ On February 18, Mary Lou Hennrich of Oregon’s Public Health Institute led a discussion for Oregon legislators about the recently released County Health Rankings, which compares Oregon counties against each other in various categories of health outcomes and health factors. Various public health leaders from around the state contributed to the discussion, including officials from Umatilla, Lincoln, Yamhill, Jefferson, and Washington Counties. At the event, Kathleen O’Leary, Chair of the Coalition of Local Health Officials, highlighted the important mobilization role of public health professionals, for which this data can be of great assistance. Mel Kohn, Oregon’s Public Health Director, emphasized the report’s assumption that clinical care accounts for only 20% of our overall health, on average (the rest being attributable to behaviors, environment, genetics, etc.). Dick Schouten, Washington County Commissioner, spoke about his upbringing in the Netherlands, and commented that Oregon can learn from that nation’s infrastructure commitment to sidewalks, walking and biking. Representative Mitch Greenlick wondered aloud if county designations were a somewhat “archaic” boundary. He also pointed out that since the rankings compare counties against each other, it doesn’t really tell us if the numbers are “good” or “bad,” but rather only how they look compared to each other. We welcome your comments: Is such “comparison measurement” a good tool for improving health? What does Jefferson County do now that it ranks lowest in both health factors and health behaviors? What does Benton County do now that it is ranked highest in both health factors and health behaviors? Are these rankings meaningful? Economic Issues, Education, Policies and Laws, Public Health, Rural Health, Urban Issues 2010-02-19T23:14:19+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/newsweek/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/newsweek/ A recent article in Newsweek reports on the town of Albert Lea, Minn., the first American town to sign on to the AARP/Blue Zones Vitality Project—the brainchild of Dan Buettner, author of “The Blue Zones,” which looks at the health habits of the world’s longest-lived people. According to Newsweek, “his goal was to bring the same benefits to middle America—not by forcing people to diet and exercise, but by changing their everyday environments in ways that encourage a healthier lifestyle…and what followed was a sort of townwide makeover”: • The city laid new sidewalks linking residential areas with schools and shopping centers. • It built a recreational path around a lake and dug new plots for community gardens. • Restaurants made healthy changes to their menus. Schools banned eating in hallways (reducing the opportunities for kids to munch on snack food). • Schools sold wreaths instead of candy for fundraisers. • More than 2,600 of the city’s 18,000 residents volunteered, some of whom formed “walking schoolbuses” to escort kids to school on foot (see photo above). In six months, participants lost an average of 2.6 pounds and boosted their estimated life expectancy by 3.1 years. The article also makes recommendations for all communities to consider. While none of the following may be new to followers of Community Health Priorities, they are still novel for the mainstream media: 1. Require graphic warnings on cigarette packages. 2. Sponsor “commitment contracts” to quit smoking. 3. Subsidize whole grains, fruits, and vegetables in the food-stamp program. 4. Set targets for salt reduction. 5. Incorporate physical education into No Child Left Behind. 6. Require that sidewalks and bike lanes be part of every federally funded road project. If you would like to learn more about the Blue Zones/ AARP project, and try to get something like this implemented in your community, more information can be found here. And if you think your community might want to participate, consider applying for a CHP grant to help get you started! Economic Issues, Education, Policies and Laws, Nutrition, Public Health, Rural Health, Transportation, Urban Issues 2010-02-08T20:13:08+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/lancet/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/lancet/ The Lancet, a British medical journal has retracted a 1998 research paper that set off a sharp decline in vaccinations in the United Kingdom when the author, Dr. Andrew Wakefield, suggested that the combined measles, mumps and rubella vaccine can be unsafe vaccines could cause autism. Britain’s General Medical Council has ruled that Dr. Wakefield acted “dishonestly and irresponsibly,” stating that two years before his paper appeared, lawyers seeking to sue vaccine makers paid Wakefield the equivalent of $700,000. Despite that, as Michael Fumento writes in the Los Angeles Times, Dr. Wakefield “is still a hero to his many acolytes. And others, with curious credentials, fight on to terrify parents into not getting their children inoculated.” Fumento expresses concern that anti-vaccination groups “have had only a marginal effect on national vaccination rates, but they have encouraged localized boycotts of immunization,” citing a Washington county with a 27% vaccine exemption rate. Here in Oregon, Ashland has one of the highest exemption rates in the nation, at over 28%, which caused the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to conduct community meetings to learn more about this community and its outlying statistic. Among the views that emerged from those discussions was a feeling that people were being “sold” these vaccines by drug companies. “I never questioned the efficacy of vaccines until a doctor tried to get me to give my daughter a hepatitis B vaccine.  Hepatitis B is a sexually transmitted disease. I knew I didn’t have hepatitis B. I knew my husband didn’t have it. There was no way she would come in contact with anyone with hepatitis B.” Another view was expressed by a nutritional consultant who said her concern was “out of respect for the immune system developing on its own and not inundating it with chemicals.” Meanwhile, Fumento cites statistics showing that pertussis once afflicted more than 250,000 American children yearly, which dropped to 1,000 new cases annually by 1976 thanks to vaccines. By 2008, however, he pointed out that cases had soared to more than 10,000 annually. Is there a way to make progress on this issue – and what would “progress” look like? Policies and Laws, Public Health 2010-02-05T17:41:38+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/abstinence/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/abstinence/ It has been called the first-ever study demonstrating the effectiveness of abstinence-only sex education. A study published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine of has found that found that abstinence-only sex education helped to delay a group of middle-school students’ sexual initiation The participants’ mean age was 12.2 years; 53.5% were girls; and 84.4% were still enrolled at 24 months. The model-estimated probability of ever having sexual intercourse by the 24-month follow-up was 33.5% in the abstinence-only intervention and 48.5% in the control group. “This is a rigorous study that means we can now say it’s possible for an abstinence-only intervention to be effective,” Dr. John B. Jemmott III, the University of Pennsylvania professor who led the study. The research followed 662 African-American students at urban middle schools, paid $20 a session to attend the classes, plus follow-up and evaluation sessions. The abstinence-only classes covered HIV, abstinence and ways to resist the pressure to have sex. The New York Times reports that the research “appears just as the Obama administration is eliminating federal financing for abstinence-only programs, and starting a pregnancy-prevention initiative that will finance programs that have been shown in scientific studies to be effective.” The Times also reported that “even longtime advocates of comprehensive sex education heralded the findings,” quoting Sarah Brown of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy as saying “This new study is game-changing.” The public health community has tended to ridicule abstinence-only education as ineffective, politically-motivated, and wishful-thinking by Christian conservatives. Is this really a “game-changer”? Will the public health community modify its conventional wisdom on this, or will it make every effort to find flaws in the study? Education, Policies and Laws, Public Health 2010-02-05T15:57:22+00:00 http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/cell/ http://www.communityhealthpriorities.org/conversation/comments/cell/ A recent piece in GQ magazine explores a difficult issue for many Americans – many earthlings in fact – to grapple with: the health hazards of cell phones. To suggest that cell phones pose serious and real health threats to human health, or as the article says, “to suggest it might be a very big public-health problem, is like saying our shoes might be killing us.” “Except our shoes don’t send microwaves directly into our brains,” the article continues, “And cell phones do—a fact that has increasingly alarmed the rest of the world. Consider, for instance, the following headlines that have appeared in highly reputable international newspapers and journals over the past few years. From summer 2006, in the Hamburg Morgenpost: ARE WE TELEPHONING OURSELVES TO DEATH? That fall, in the Danish journal Dagens Medicin: MOBILE PHONES AFFECT THE BRAIN’S METABOLISM. December 2007, from Agence France-Presse: ISRAELI STUDY SAYS REGULAR MOBILE USE INCREASES TUMOUR RISK. January 2008, in London’s Independent: MOBILE PHONE RADIATION WRECKS YOUR SLEEP. September 2008, in Australia’s The Age: SCIENTISTS WARN OF MOBILE PHONE CANCER RISK.” See the entire GQ article here. What do you think? Are cell phones a public health issue? A public health threat? And if it is, who would pay for the damage to the public good? Would the cell phone industry pay, or would it be just another example of how, with issues such as tobacco use, junk food, fast food, and automobile use, we privatize the profits and socialize the costs? Economic Issues, Policies and Laws, Public Health 2010-02-01T18:49:04+00:00