On June 24, President Trump signed the Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness and Advancing Innovation Act into law. This important piece of legislation helps ensure that critical initiatives such as the ADHS Public Health Emergency Preparedness program and the Hospital Preparedness Program will receive funding through 2023. The Association of State and Territorial Health Officers (ASTHO) [...]
Poisoning (including alcohol and prescription drugs) causes more deaths than car crashes in Arizona. A recent report issued by the Trust for America's Health ranked Arizona as having the 6th highest death rate for drug overdose in the country in 2010. Arizona also had one of the highest rates (4th highest at 5.7%) of nonmedical [...]
We did it… and by we, I mean ADHS and partners around the state. We accepted the Association of Territorial and State Health Officers (ASTHO) challenge to reduce the rate of babies born too early by 8% by 2014. On Friday, ADHS and the March of Dimes Arizona Chapter received the Virginia Apgar award. The [...]
This has been an excellent week to learn what others in my position are doing across the country. All the state health directors met in Florida this week to look ahead and strategize about the coming year’s goals. I’m always proud when our award-winning programs are highlighted, but it’s a great opportunity to talk to [...]
One of the most important aspects of public health is sharing effective, creative ideas with other public health agencies so more people can benefit from what we learn. Each year the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials highlights really good programs with their Vision Awards. This year, they selected 2 from Arizona to share [...]
Food marketing to children and teens is a major public health concern. Earlier this year, the Walt Disney Company announced it will no longer accept advertisements for junk food on its child-directed television, radio, and online sites. Disney also updated its nutrition standards for foods that can be advertised to children. The food and beverage [...]
A couple of weeks ago I mentioned that Dr. David Lakey, this year’s President of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials has selected the Healthy Babies Project for his national initiative- challenging each state to implement strategies to reduce prematurity and infant mortality based on successful national, regional, and state efforts to improve [...]
Every year each of the folks in my job around the country (called the State Health Officers) get together and elect a President of our association (called the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials or ASTHO). Each President picks a public health challenge during his or her term. This year’s ASTHO President is Dr. [...]
I was fortunate to be able to attend parts of this year’s conference of state health officers in Portland. Each year the folks in my job get together with the CDC and other federal partners and public health support organizations to strategize about the coming year’s national public health priorities and share best practices and resources. The [...]
