ATOD Section Chair’s Column - February 2008
Happy New Year to all! I hope 2008 is going great for you already! I’d like to begin by thanking all of you who participated in ATOD Section activities at the Annual Meeting in November. I think our Section scientific sessions, business meetings and social events were all a huge success thanks to you. All who participated, planned or funded these events — especially all our dedicated Section leaders who played such an important role — please accept my congratulations and sincere gratitude. Of course, all of us are most grateful to our sponsors who made critical contributions to Section socials and other activities because we couldn’t do these things without your active support. We really hope we can count on you to be ongoing partners with the ATOD Section in the future. Your support allows us to expand the scope of our activities as a Section and develop new initiatives in the alcohol, tobacco and other drugs field.
Congratulations to all our ATOD Section award winners who were featured at our Awards Ceremony and in our last newsletter! Please let me add a personal note of congratulations and support for your important contributions to the ATOD field and thanks for your ongoing commitment and dedication to the ATOD Section of APHA. Our collective success is truly a function of the work you’ve done whether you’ve just recently joined the Section, or devoted your entire career to focusing public attention on these issues and reducing the devastating health effects of alcohol, tobacco and other drug use. I also want to share my personal thanks with Diana Conti, our past Section chair and chair of the APHA Intersectional Council, who ran for Association treasurer. Although she didn’t win the election, she spent lots of time campaigning and representing ATOD to countless other members of the Association and bringing our issues front and center among our colleagues — we can all be proud of how well she represented us! Diana, thanks so much for your many years of service to ATOD and to APHA, and to everyone who helped with her efforts, thank you too!
About the time you get this newsletter, you’ll have seen notices about the Call for Abstracts for the 2008 Annual Meeting. You can find the notice online at http://apha.confex.com/apha/136am/atod.htm ATOD abstracts were due Feb. 8, 2008. If you have any questions, please contact our wonderful Program Committee Chair Linda Bosma, whose info is listed in the call for abstracts. Thanks again to Linda and the great committee she’s leading for all their work on compiling a very impressive scientific program at the Annual Meeting. As always, we need many volunteers to help review abstracts, so if you’re willing to devote some time to ensuring that we have the strongest possible program again next year, please contact Linda immediately. We can always use help from experienced Section members in compiling the program at our mid-year meeting in April, so if you’re interested in helping in this way, please let her know that, too. Thanks for all your interest in and service to the field of ATOD!
Are you interested in getting more involved in the ATOD Section? Perhaps running for one of our leadership positions? We have several vacancies for the upcoming year and welcome new input. Fran Stillman, our Section Nominating Committee chair, would love to hear from you. Please contact her ASAP at fstillma@jhsph.edu. You can find more info about these offices at www.apha.org/membergroups/sections/elections/ but you better act quickly if you’re interested. Fran is also coordinating our efforts to recruit Section members to serve on various APHA-wide boards and committees, so if you have an interest in getting more involved in the Association, please contact her soon about that, too. Thanks for your interest and willingness to serve your colleagues in public health, and the people of the United States.
I want to commend Wegmans for their decision to stop selling tobacco products.
Wegmans supermarket chain has taken an extraordinary step to protect public health by announcing that effective Feb.10, 2008, it will stop selling cigarettes and other tobacco products in all of its stores. All of us in the public health community should congratulate Wegmans for putting the health and wellness of their customers ahead of profits from selling deadly and addictive tobacco products. Wegmans has set an excellent example for other supermarkets and retailers to follow. Wegmans has acknowledged that tobacco products are no ordinary consumer product, and that they are the leading preventable cause of death in the United States, killing more than 400,000 people, sickening millions more and costing the nation nearly $100 billion in health care bills each year. It is encouraging that a growing number of businesses, such as Wegmans and hotel chains that have adopted smoke-free policies, are joining the public health community in seeking to reduce tobacco use and its devastating consequences. Please take the time to support Wegmans decision by writing them a quick note telling them you’re glad they have established this voluntary policy and have taken strong leadership on this important health issue. Click here to thank Wegmans for being champions of public health by no longer selling tobacco products. Tell them you appreciate their decision to put health and lives ahead of profits from selling deadly and addictive tobacco products.
Feel free to encourage your local supermarket or pharmacy to take similar action. Please encourage the growing number of businesses that have joined the public health community in seeking to reduce tobacco use and its deadly consequences by telling them you’re happy they’ve decided to put health ahead of profits. Wegmans operates 71 stores in New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Virginia and Maryland. Click here to find a Wegmans store near you.
A quick plug for one of our sister organizations, the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco (SRNT). The SRNT Annual Conference will be in late February in Portland, Oregon. Feel free to attend if you’re interested in learning more about the latest research findings from a broad range of tobacco control and nicotine addiction issues. Get details on the meeting at http://srnt.org/meeting/2008/index.html.
Finally, I want to point you toward our new ATOD Section Web site at www.apha.org/membergroups/sections/aphasections/atod/. Please bookmark the new URL and check back periodically to see highlights or news from the Section. We really are excited about the possibilities for our new Section Web site and hope you’ll be willing to share ideas for content that will make this site as useful as possible for all of you. Feel free to check back for abstract submission info or other updates. If you have questions about the site or want to offer suggestions for useful content, please contact Mark Parascandola, one of our Section Councilors who is championing this effort, at paramark@mail.nih.gov or (301) 496-8584. Thanks, Mark!
As always, I’m happy to invite you to get more involved in our Section! Feel free to contact any of our Section Leaders listed here depending on your particular interests or expertise, or any of the individuals listed in the following articles — we’d all be glad to hear from you and get your help on our respective initiatives. If you have a topic that’s particularly important to you and that you think should be on the radar screen of the ATOD Section but isn’t yet, feel free to call me at (301) 496-0275. I’ll be glad to hear from you and discuss how we can advance the issues by working together.
Take it Easy & Enjoy Life!
Bob Vollinger
Bob.Vollinger@nih.gov