468: Pandemic Preps, New Ways to Think About Public Health

ROBERT JOHNSON: 

This is the award-winning Public Health Review Morning Edition for Wednesday, July 26, 2023. I'm Robert Johnson. Now, today's news from the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials.

THOMAS DOBBS: 

One of our biggest failures as a country is not recognizing the importance of a robust public health infrastructure.

JOHNSON: 

Dr. Thomas Dobbs is an ASTHO alum and dean of the Bauer School of Population Health at the University of Mississippi Medical Center. His latest article in the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice outlines the actions leaders should take now to get ready for the next pandemic.

DOBBS: 

We need funding. We need support, we need support from political leaders across the country, state and national level. We need to make the case to our leaders that we are like a standing army to defend us from health threats.

JOHNSON: 

Dobbs also argues public health is in urgent need of stronger relationships.

DOBBS: 

We need to make sure that our community members and our political leaders know the importance of public health, understand the elements of it, because it's something that people don't see every day. They don't know about it until it's a crisis. So, having clear communications and having relationships going into a pandemic, are going to be absolutely critical.

JOHNSON: 

Finally, Dobbs says it's important to de-politicize public health whenever possible.

DOBBS: 

We are here for everyone, and we follow science. We follow data, and of course we'll attacked. But we need to be able to transcend political noise to the benefit of all, and to be resilient, to be willing to take our blows from any sort of political angle.

JOHNSON: 

You can read the article by clicking the link in the show notes.

Across the board, agencies are evaluating their approach to public health. The pandemic raised a lot of questions about the practice and its impact on communities. Raymond Neal is with Human Impact Partners.

RAYMOND NEAL: 

Health Equity strategies have to become part of the standard processes for public health organizations and systems. And they must show up in the experiences for the community, which is why an expanded definition of health, whether it's co-defined or co-designed by the community and the governmental public health, needs to happen. Long-term needs to be standard.

JOHNSON: 

Neal says a movement toward more accountability in public health requires resources in order to be successful.

NEAL: 

Governmental public health needs the resources from the larger systems to be able to do what they need to do. These resources need to be free to use for internal capacity building, as well as building capacity with the community.

JOHNSON: 

He also advises leadership to help people identify and focus on their passion.

NEAL: 

I would say that governmental public health has to help its staff and employees figure out where their self-interest is in this work. This work is incredibly important. And there really is going to be very little room ongoing for not a full effort from individuals who work in the field.

JOHNSON: 

Learn more about Neal's approach using the link in the show notes.

Also today, ASTHO is talking about a new toolkit to help agencies better prepare for power outages that impact life support users. The discussion is online. It begins at noon ET today. There's a link to sign up in the show notes.

Finally, this morning, ASTHO has job openings. They include a position for a manager of digital learning design, a senior analyst of program operations, and a virtual event producer. You can learn more and apply using the link in the show notes.

And if you have a minute, please take the time to give us a review. You can get there by clicking the button in your podcast player.

That'll do it for today's newscast. We're back tomorrow morning with more ASTHO news and information. I'm Robert Johnson. You're listening to the award-winning Public Health Review Morning Edition. Have a great day.