As health reform and other health-related legislation are being discussed in Washington, efforts are needed to clarify the importance of continued investment in public health and primary prevention, building the public health workforce and public health research. Congress is out of session on recess for Independence Day and many congressional representatives are back in their districts. Some are taking the time to talk to their constituents about issues related to health. It is important to reach out to your representatives and emphasize that public health and prevention measures must remain included in any health reform bill.

If you are looking for ways to relax this summer while still broadening your intellectual horizons, the Schools of Public Health are here to help. Deans from the ASPH-member schools have provided book recommendations to help fill the summer days with interesting and thought-provoking readings. A list of the deans’ recommendations is compiled below:

ASPH staff attended the 17^th Annual Conference of the National Association of Local Boards of Health (NALBOH). Held in Philadelphia from July 1-3, the conference theme was "Improving Public Health Through Leadership and Knowledge."

The ASPH Friday Letter invites members of the ASPH-community to submit entries for its Photo-of-the-Month Contest. Each month staff will choose a photo that depicts a public health experience of students, faculty and staff of ASPH-member schools or affiliates of ASPH partners. Photo submissions should capture an experience, such as a school/community event or service project, faculty or student research experience, a fellowship/internship experience or a new public health initiative.

Public Health Reports (PHR) is a bimonthly peer-reviewed journal offering articles in public health practice, research and viewpoints/commentaries, and is one of the public health community’s key information resources. The journal is distributed to member schools, the research community, academic libraries, government agencies and many health related industries. Advertising in PHR is an excellent way to connect with practitioners, scholars and students of public health. Click here for more information.

On Friday, June 26, Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius released data on health care costs, insurance coverage rates and other statistics for each of the 50 states, and stated that these indicators highlight the need for health system reform.

Adult obesity rates increased in 23 states and did not decrease in a single state in the past year, according to F as in Fat: How Obesity Policies Are Failing in America 2009, a report released today by the Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF).  In addition, the percentage of obese or overweight children is at or above 30 percent in 30 states.

The George Washington University School of Public Health and Health Services department of health policy’s Center for Health Policy Research, released a policy brief that examines Medicaid’s non-emergency medical transportation assurance and the role played by the assurance as policymakers debate national health reform. The brief reviews the origins and evolution of the assurance and presents the results of a 2009 survey of state Medicaid programs regarding the current state of Medicaid transportation.

ASPH hosts a public health advocacy section on its web site, which provides an opportunity to share information on advocacy efforts with all ASPH members. The site also highlights information on policy priorities, including several policy papers exploring the nation’s public health priorities, and provides links to sources of legislative information and resources and tips on how to contact Members of Congress. ASPH will also use the web site to post alerts on activities on the Hill that are critical to public health. Visit www.asph.org/advocacy for more information.

ASPH regularly provides members and Friday Letter readers with information about grant opportunities. New opportunities are listed each week in the "Funding Opportunities" section of the Friday Letter. Readers can access a full listing of grant notices by visiting the "Funding for Faculty" section of the ASPH web site. You may want to bookmark this page (www.asph.org/document.cfm?page=747). Listed below are grant opportunities that have been posted within the last seven days.

Susan G. Komen for the Cure has announced a request for applications for special focus-prevention grants in its 2009-2010 research program.

This funding opportunity, issued by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), National Institutes of Health (NIH), invites research applications for projects that support development of therapeutics, immunotherapeutics, medical diagnostics and broad-spectrum vaccines for NIAID Category B food and water-borne priority pathogens and toxins.

Through this funding opportunity announcement, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) solicits applications for the Cancer Intervention and Surveillance Modeling Network (CISNET). The goal of CISNET is to use simulation and other modeling techniques (a) to understand the impact of cancer control interventions (i.e., screening, treatment, prevention) on national trends in cancer rates, and (b) to inform national/regional/local decisions on the most efficient utilization of existing and emerging technologies and strategies for the control of cancer.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), National Institutes of Health, invites applications from single institutions and consortia of institutions to participate in this funding opportunity for Enterics Research Investigational Network (ERIN) Cooperative Research Centers (CRCs).

The National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) Cutting-Edge Basic Research Award (CEBRA) is designed to foster highly innovative or conceptually creative research related to drug abuse and addiction and how to prevent and treat them.

Ms. Anne E. Rositch, doctoral student in epidemiology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) Gillings School of Global Public Health, was selected this spring as a Fogarty International Clinical Research Scholar. Beginning in July, she will live in Nairobi, Kenya for about a year, contributing to a study that focuses on human papillomavirus, cervical precancerous lesions and HIV transmission. Under the auspices of The University of Washington at Seattle and The University of Nairobi, Ms. Rositch will conduct research ancillary to a study led by Dr. Jennifer Smith, UNC research assistant professor of epidemiology and Ms. Rositch's mentor.

"Environmental Heroes," a documentary developed through the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) School of Journalism and Mass Communication science documentary television course, airs on Saturday, July 4 at 11 p.m. (Eastern) during the "North Carolina Visions" film festival on UNC-TV (North Carolina Public Television). Students from the journalism school and the Gillings School of Global Public Health were writers and producers on the project.

A program started at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) has received an award of up to $8.5 million over a period of five years from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The funding will help expand a project to bring clean drinking water and improved sanitation and hygiene to homes in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam. The program, called WaterSHED (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene Enterprise Development), is a joint effort between UNC's Gillings School of Global Public Health, Kenan-Flagler Business School and the Kenan Institute-Asia. The award will be managed by the public health school, and Dr. Mark Sobsey, Kenan Distinguished Professor of environmental sciences and engineering, is the principal investigator.

The Northeast Regional Public Health Leadership Institute (NEPHLI) at the University at Albany School of Public Health has presented its 2009 Excellence in Leadership Award to Dr. Jane Francisco Bedell, the assistant commissioner of the Bronx District Public Health Office of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. Since 2002, NEPHLI has presented this award to the person or organization within the region, which best models the qualities of exemplary leadership as defined by Mr. James M. Kouzes and Dr. Barry Z. Posner in the book entitled, The Leadership Challenge.

The Office of Workforce Development, within the Ohio State University College of Public Health, is the new Center for Public Health Practice as of Wednesday, July 1. This change coincides with the start-date of the center’s new director, Dr. Michael Bisesi, who also serves as the college’s associate dean of academic affairs. Dr. Bisesi comes to Ohio State from the University of Toledo where he served as senior associate dean of Health Science Campus Graduate Programs and chair of Public Health in the College of Medicine at the University of Toledo.

The department of kinesiology at the University of Maryland School of Public Health, in collaboration with the University of Maryland School of Medicine, recently co-hosted the 8^th Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) International Conference.

Emory University has been selected by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, globally headquartered in Chicago, as one of 10 universities worldwide to receive significant support in the amount of $900,000 to create a new master’s degree program in development practice.

The Institute for Global Tobacco Control (IGTC) has graduated its first class of 11 international students in its Global Tobacco Control Certificate Program, one of the first academic training programs of its kind worldwide. The IGTC, located at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, launched the program in 2008 to provide international professionals and research scientists with formal academic training in global tobacco control.

The Johns Hopkins Center for Injury Research and Policy is one of  four injury control research centers (ICRC) nationwide selected for funding by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (CDC’s Injury Center). Injury Control Research Centers conduct research in all three core phases of injury control (prevention, acute care, and rehabilitation) and serve as training centers as well as information centers for the public and health professionals.

A generous donation made by San Antonio philanthropist Dr. A David Mangelsdorff has led to the establishment of a trust to endow the new A. David Mangelsdorff Professorship in Community Preparedness and Public Health at The University of Texas School of Public Health (UT SPH) San Antonio Regional Campus (SARC). The professorship—the first for San Antonio’s Regional Campus—will allow the Campus to focus on new and critical areas of public health and disaster preparedness that have particular relevance to the San Antonio area. A recipient of the professorship will be named in the coming months.

Dr. David M. Stevens, research professor in the department of health policy at The George Washington University (GWU) School of Public Health and Health Services and director of the Quality Center at the National Association of Community Health Centers, has been chosen to be a part of a panel of leading experts on Medicaid managed care that will convene to consider updates to the National Committee for Quality Assurance’s (NCQA) Accreditation program for Medicaid health plans. NCQA Accreditation is the health care industry’s most rigorous and utilized yardstick for health plan quality.

In an effort to get healthy, six of the Dean’s staff members at the University of South Florida (USF) College of Public Health joined a Weight Watchers at work group in January 2009. The group includes: Ms. Marilyn Batchellor, Ms. Faye Maciaszek, Ms. Sandy Miller, Ms. Wendy Morales, Ms. Peggy Smith and Ms. Sandy Wirth.

Dr. Kenneth Beck, a professor at the University of Maryland School of Public Health, has developed an online survey for Maryland residents to share their concerns and attitudes toward traffic safety. The survey, which Marylanders can take by logging onto www.marylanddriversurvey.com, launched on Wednesday, July 1. Dr. Beck, an expert in traffic safety and injury prevention, developed the survey in collaboration with Maryland’s Department of Transportation, Maryland State Highway Administration’s Safety Office.

Dr. Daniel T. Boatright, director of the University of Oklahoma’s Southwest Center for Public Health Preparedness, has been nominated to undertake a week long speaking tour of Ireland and Northern Ireland as part of a U.S. State Department sponsored international initiative. The visit, on behalf of the State Department’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, will be coordinated through Boston College’s Irish Institute.

The Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality (SSSS) selected Dr. Mark Padilla, assistant professor of health behavior and health education at the University of Michigan School of Public Health, to receive this year's John Money Award for 2009. The award is given annually by Eastern Region of the SSSS to a scholar who has made significant contributions to the understanding of human sexuality. Dr. Padilla was keynote speaker at the SSSS conference in June, where he received the award. It recognizes his work on masculinity and sexuality in the Dominican Republic.

Dr. Nirbhay Kumar has been selected as the new chair of the department of tropical medicine at the Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, effective January 2010.  He replaces acting chair Dr. Richard Oberhelman.

Although it is known that infants are more susceptible than adults to the toxic effects of pesticides, this increased vulnerability may extend much longer into childhood than expected, according to a new study by researchers at the University of California (UC), Berkeley School of Public Health.

The current H1N1 swine flu strain has genetic roots in an illness that sickened pigs at the 1918 Cedar Rapids Swine Show in Iowa, report infectious disease experts at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health in the New England Journal of Medicine. Their paper, published online and slated for the July 16 print issue, describes H1N1’s nearly century-long and often convoluted journey, which may include the accidental resurrection of an extinct strain.

Heart patients who are older, female or black are associated with higher costs for coronary artery bypass graft (CABG), according to a study by University at Albany researchers. In addition to patient factors, Dr. Shadi Saleh of the University at Albany's School of Public Health and colleagues found that larger hospitals were also associated with higher costs of CABG hospitalizations, but that costs decreased with a higher volume of heart patients.

An emergency rule intended to reduce the number of deaths and injuries associated with Hawaiian air tours was followed by a 47 percent reduction in sightseeing crashes, according to a new study by researchers from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health’s Center for Injury Research and Policy.

Exposure to Hepatitis E Virus (HEV) appears to be common in the U.S., although disease following exposure is rarely reported, according to a study led by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The study found antibodies indicating exposure to HEV in 21 percent of the U.S. population between 1988 and 1994. HEV is a major cause of viral hepatitis in many developing countries, but how it is spread in developed countries is not fully known. The study is published in the July 1 issue of the Journal of Infectious Diseases.

Researchers at The University of Texas School of Public Health have developed a game for HIV-positive youth, +CLICK, designed to reduce secondary transmission of the virus. +CLICK was developed by Dr. Christine Markham and Dr. Ross Shegog., assistant professors of behavioral sciences. The game’s usability and credibility were assessed by HIV-positive (HIV+) youth at a Texas Children’s Hospital clinic.

It appears that it is the rate of linear growth (growth upward) is associated with an increase in the incidence of type I diabetes. Furthermore, this relationship is not seen in the "normal" population but rather, in the population of children who have been identified to have a greater genetic risk of developing type I diabetes. This finding will soon be published in the journal, Diabetologia (see here), and is the work of Dr. Jill Norris and colleagues; faculty members at the University of Colorado Denver School of Public Health and the Barbara Davis Center.

ASPH will regularly provide members and Friday Letter readers with links to other electronic newsletters that may be of interest to the public health community. Links to E-newsletters will be added to a web page found at www.asph.org/document.cfm?page=924. This week’s additions include:

CCPH E-news, Community Campus Partnerships for Health, July 2009
http://depts.washington.edu/ccph/enews.html

CFR Global Health Update, Council on Foreign Relations, June 30, 2009
www.cfr.org/issue/ (sign-up)

Harvard Public Health Now: Harvard School of Public Health, June 26, 2009
www.hsph.harvard.edu/now/

HSHPS eNewsflash, Hispanic Serving Health Professions Schools, July 2009
Click here to view.

MEFS Newsletter, Medical Education Futures Study, June 29, 2009
www.medicaleducationfutures.org/ContNews-5773.html (sign-up)

NHANES E-Newsletter, National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, June 2009
www.cdc.gov/emailupdates/index.html (sign-up)

NNPHI News, National Network of Public Health Institutes, May/June 2009
Click here to view.

School of Public Health e-Newsletter, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Volume 1, No. 1
Click here to view.

Trachoma Matters, International Trachoma Initiative, Spring/Summer 2009
www.trachoma.org/core/sub.php?cat=resources&id=publications

Washington Health Policy Week in Review, The Commonwealth Fund, June 29, 2009
Click here to view.

The Center for Public Health Practice, within The Ohio State University College of Public Health, is offering a free, online course to nurses on how to prepare, respond and recover from public health disasters, such as infectious disease outbreaks and floods.

Ms. Michelle Sonia, 2009 graduate of the Master of Science in Public Health program in health policy and management at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC) Gillings School of Global Public Health, will present her research on early detection of breast cancer at the 137th annual American Public Health Association (APHA) meeting, November 7-11, in Philadelphia, Pa. She is one of 19 students from across the U.S. selected for the honor by The Delta Omega Honorary Society in Public Health.

Epidemiologic Reviews, a sister publication of the American Journal of Epidemiology, is devoted to publishing comprehensive and critical reviews on specific themes once a year. The theme of the 2010 issue will be "Epidemiologic Approaches to Global Health." Manuscript submissions will be accepted only during the month of July.

In order to fully test the accreditation program in advance of its 2011 launch, the Public Health Accreditation Board (PHAB) will conduct a beta test starting in the fall of 2009.  PHAB is currently seeking health departments to partner on the beta test, as well as a qualified evaluation contractor to gather and analyze feedback from participants in the beta test.

On Wednesday, July 8 from 12-1 p.m. (Central), the Upper Midwest Center for Public Health Preparedness will host a presentation on the Safeguard Iowa Partnership as part of its summer 2009 Grand Round Sessions. Ms. Jami Haverl, executive director of the Safeguard Iowa Parnership, will discuss the partnership's role in bringing together a voluntary coalition of the state’s business and government leaders to prevent, prepare for, respond to, and recover from catastrophic events in Iowa.

A one-day conference titled "Vaccine Preventable Diseases: Evidence and Strategies to Protect Our Communities" will be held simultaneously at three locations in New Jersey (North, Central & South) on Monday, July 13. The conference will focus on issues related to immunization required for New Jersey children. Specific presentations will focus on the evidence behind increasing immunization requirements, consequences of specific vaccine-preventable diseases without vaccination, compliance and enforcement of regulations and strategies to increase compliance.

From August 24-26, the National Human Genome Research Institute and the Office of Medical Applications of Research of the National Institutes of Health will convene a State-of-the-Science conference on "Family History and Improving Health." The conference will be held at the Natcher Conference Center on the National Institutes of Health Campus in Bethesda, MD.

New!
Volume 124
Issue 4
July/August 2009

Public Health Reports (PHR) is an informative and accessible resource for practitioners, teachers and students of public health. The Journal provides important research and key discussions on the major issues confronting the public health community. Subscribe Today! Click here to advertise in the Journal.

New!
Volume 124
Supplement 1

The first Supplement issue of Public Health Reports (PHR) for 2009 is titled "Occupational Interventions." PHR provides important research and key discussions on the major issues confronting the public health community. Subscribe Today! Click here to advertise in the Journal.