APHA Environmental Health Update

Update from APHA Environmental Health Policy Staff

Happy New Year from APHA’s environmental health policy staff! We have accomplished a great deal over the past year and are looking forward to another exciting year ahead. APHA priorities for Congress and the new administration are now online and include climate change and transportation policy.

Some of you may have heard: we have a new director for the Center for Public Health Policy at APHA, Sue Abramson. Sue comes to us from the George Washington University’s Department of Health Policy. Please join us in welcoming her!

The fall was busy and productive! APHA has committed to working diligently to ensure that new transportation policies are healthy and equitable. At the Annual Meeting, many of you saw our report At the Intersection of Public Health and Transportation, which was developed as part of our partnership with Transportation for America. In December, APHA met with other public health partners to create a consensus policy platform to further support the T4America campaign. In November, APHA staff and members participated in a CDC Linking Transportation Policy and Public Health meeting where attendees identified strategies that promote public health objectives in national transportation policies. Our support of transportation policy transformation will continue throughout the coming year.

In December, we embarked on a revitalization of an environmental public health coalition – to enhance coordination and collaboration among partners at the national level. APHA will work closely with a subset of these organizations to establish support and leadership for the coalition. Ultimately we aim to develop mechanisms for better communication, identify opportunities for joint action, and capitalize on shared resources.

Later this month we will be posting a new product on our site – Breathing Easier – describing the activities and successes of CDC’s National Asthma Control Program.

From Feb. 24-26, the CDC National Environmental Public Health Tracking Program will launch their network at during the TRACKS 2009 Conference in Washington, D.C. Please consider attending the conference and definitely check out the network in February!

Finally, we’ve all heard that stories – not facts – are what motivate people. We have taken that message to heart.  As part of our efforts to update our environmental health Web page we would like to begin collecting your stories – about the value of environmental public health, why you are a passionate professional, how you got into the field – anything that will help connect what we all do to those less familiar. We are working to figure out how to best collect these and so anticipate hearing more about this soon.

Best wishes in the new year!

Tracy and Amanda