Hello from Washington DC, our nation’s capital and the stellar venue for this year’s Association of Maternal and Child Health Programs (AMCHP) conference. Minnesota’s MCH program is certainly well represented in 2011: counting yours truly, we have six current students at the conference along with several gainfully employed graduates. Each morning we convene for coffee […]
Tag: Politics
Edward Ehlinger appointed Health Commissioner
More news in the good-for-Minnesotans (and GREAT for MCH) category… Edward Ehlinger — former medical director at the University of Minnesota’s Boynton Medical Center and adjunct faculty at the School of Public Health — was recently appointed Commissioner of Health by Governor Mark Dayton. Ehlinger is a stalwart proponent of public health, one who regularly […]
More data, please! Ezra Klein on the investment deficit (and why numbers matter)
A column by Ezra Klein in last week’s Washington Post should provide some comfort to recent (and soon-to-be!) graduates of public health programs around the country. The bad news first: along with the staggering federal budget deficit, Americans face an investment deficit that will have repercussions for decades. Americans need to invest more money into […]
“Don’t ask, don’t tell” and your health
The recent repeal of “Don’t ask, don’t tell” (DADT) should provide some additional holiday cheer for public health professionals–as it represents a substantial victory not just for GLBTQ advocates, but for all of us who care about protecting and promoting sexual and reproductive health. DADT, a federal law designed to prohibit gay and lesbian military […]
World AIDS Day 2010
Today is World AIDS Day 2010 and the U.S. is joining more than 200 countries around the globe to call attention to the worldwide epidemic. Roughly 33 million people are estimated to be living with HIV or AIDS around the globe. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that 56,300 new HIV cases […]
Increasing poverty, decreasing health coverage: new Census Report findings
The recently released (9/16/2010) 2009 Census Report found striking evidence of our ongoing Great Recession: An increase in the nation’s poverty rate to 14.3% — according to the press release, “the second statistically significant annual increase in the poverty rate since 2004” and the highest percentage of total poverty since 1994. That’s 44 million individuals, […]
Child Nutrition Act cut in half
Not much of a surprise for those of us who’ve been watching this bill — last week, the Senate voted to cut President Obama’s proposed budget for the School Nutrition Act in half, from $10 billion to $4.5 billion. $4.5 billion sounds like a lot, just like $10 billion sounds like a lot, so let’s […]
Let’s Move: What’s next?
My last post on “Let’s Move,” Michelle Obama’s new anti-obesity initiative, brought up a number of questions about the program’s ambitious goal: “To solve the epidemic of childhood obesity within a generation.” The main question, of course, is this: where will the money come from? Obama’s $400 million dollar Healthy Food Financing Initiative, as described […]
Let’s Move: Michelle Obama’s new plan to end obesity
The Obama Administration’s new childhood health campaign, “Let’s Move,” has just one goal: “To solve the epidemic of childhood obesity within a generation.” Ambitious? Yes. Impossible? Maybe not. Let’s take a look at the plan’s specific objectives: 1) Parental support. As letsmove.gov notes, parents “play a key role in making healthy choices for their children.” “Let’s […]
NYT poll: nearly half of unemployed do not have health insurance
Nearly half of the unemployed Americans surveyed in a recent New York Times/CBS News poll indicate that they do not have health insurance. The survey, conducted in December via telephone interview, sampled 1,650 U.S. adults, 708 of whom are unemployed. Of those, more than half “have cut back on doctor visits or medical treatments,” 25% […]