George Jesien, PhD

Membership in the Disability Section has held steady at about 275 members over the last year. Two hundred and fifty members have the Disability Section as their primary Section, and 25 members have the Disability Section as their secondary or tertiary section. From one perspective this is good news in that membership has held steady as many membership organizations have been slowly losing members during these tough economic times. On the other hand, it does indicate that the Disability Section has not been growing within the overall APHA membership. The Disability Section makes up slightly more than 1 percent of the overall APHA membership. A goal set by the Membership Committee is to go over the 300 member mark by the time of the APHA Annual Meeting and to move toward the goal of 2 percent of APHA membership by the end of the calendar year. Currently 71 percent of the members are in the regular membership category, while 14 percent are students and the remainder are either retired, or are consumers or special health workers.

This is a great time to join APHA and the Disability Section. Recently passed health care reform legislation will provide new impetus for health promotion and health prevention initiatives as well as workforce development opportunities. A steady stream of new information will be become available as implementation plans are rolled out and new regulations that affect people with disabilities are promulgated. The Disability Section and APHA will serve as a great resource for information, policy developments, current research and national news. Disability Section members will benefit by participating in an informational listserv, the quarterly newsletter and access to the Disability and Health Journal at a reduced fee. To help us meet our goal of growing the Disability Section within APHA, ask your colleagues to join at: http://secure.apha.org/scriptcontent/custom/join/apply.cfm  or contact Membership Chair George Jesien at (gjesien@aucd.org) for an electronic version of the Disability Section Brochure.