Population Health in Challenging Times: Insights from Key Domains Proceedings of a Workshop (2023) / Chapter Skim
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5 Public Health
5 Public Health
Pages 29-36
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From page 29... ...
• Funding remains a key challenge for governmental public health, and this mo ment of visibility could be used to advocate for public health as a public good or a utility, regardless of the size of the health department. (Valdes Lupi)
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From page 30... ...
Umair Shah, executive director and local health authority of the Harris County Department of Public Health, agreed with the characterization of the current moment as both a "challenge and opportunity," but also commented on the often politicized nature of the response to the pandemic. He talked about addressing the invisibility crisis that public health faces using three Vs: raise visibility, which brings value, which in turn brings validation in the form of prohealth policies and/or prohealth resources.
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From page 31... ...
Communicating complicated issues to the public is a challenge, so working with trusted community partners is crucial. Shah summarized some of the communication skills that public health leaders need but may lack, from risk communications to social media to being able to communicate complex topics clearly and in a reassuring, not scary, manner during times of crisis.
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From page 32... ...
Montero spoke about the assets that public health brings to the table in the conversation about the social factors that shape health outcomes. Although public health cannot solve the challenges related to employment, housing, or education, public health has the ability to view health issues and health outcomes in the context of the society and community where life happens.
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From page 33... ...
"We know," she said, "that Black, Brown and Indigenous Americans die much earlier than their White counterparts." Valdes Lupi said that she would, as she did in Boston, implement training on antiracism and work to operationalize an equity ethos through equitable procurement policy, such as contracting with community vendors, to invest in local neighborhoods and minority-owned businesses. Administration and finance may not be glamorous activities, but they are critical in rounding out the work of the public health workforce so that resources are allocated to the breadth of key public health issues.
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From page 34... ...
Another audience member asked about the steady decrease in public health funding due to, as Auerbach added, the failure to replenish what was lost in the 2008 recession, along with tens of thousands of public health jobs lost.1 The pandemic has further decreased government resources at all levels. Montero spoke about the fact that health departments never recovered at the jurisdictional level from the recession, and the pandemic has had an additional effect.
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From page 35... ...
Khaldun would say to build out a national strategy on COVID-19 and to "rebuild trust in public health and the scientific community." Barbot would call for a "national health equity action plan" that focused on funding public health to target communities that are facing the greatest inequities and that also questions why the United States still has primarily employer-based health insurance in light of the fact that job losses due to COVID-19 have also meant loss of health insurance. Shah would call for ending the devaluation of public health, for supporting and elevating federal agencies like CDC to their previous status, and for ensuring that CDC's work is well coordinated with state and local public health partners.
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From page 36... ...
All of these issues, along with ending the pandemic, are all on the public health sector's long to-do list.
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