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Welcome to the January/February issue of HSPH
Update, an e-letter for friends of the
Harvard School of Public Health.
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From the Harvard Public Health Review
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Can cost-effective health care=better health care?
 Experts agree that curbing costs is essential to effective health care
reform in the United States if we are ever to provide medical treatment
for everyone who needs it. But how to cut costs while maintaining high
quality? In this special report, the Review talks to Harvard
School of Public Health researchers to examine how U.S. health care can
cover more people by more rationally using resources--but without health
care rationing. read more |
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Plastics: Hidden health risks
A confusing patchwork of regulations on plastics containing  the
chemical bisphenol A (BPA) have left consumers in the lurch. Should we
avoid the plastic water bottles, food cans, and myriad other products
in our daily lives that contain BPA? Are we being harmed by a chemical
that the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says is
present in detectable levels in 93 percent of Americans ages 6 and
older? What should we do when the experts themselves can't agree? read more |
Dean's Message: H1N1 and Comprehensive Health Security
The H1N1 pandemic has had a profound impact on global security. This
pandemic clearly shows us that, in health matters, the world has become
a single neighborhood--and that the consequences of actions taking place
far away show up, literally, at our doorstep. read more |
HSPH Alum Tracks Clues to Pandemics Before They Erupt
SARS, Ebola, and, most
tragically, HIV/AIDS: Could scientists have detected these animal
infections before they leapt species to become human plagues? If so,
could timely public health measures have changed their deadly
trajectories? In the 12 years since he wrote in his HSPH doctoral thesis, "Perhaps by
learning from primates in their natural environments we
may better prepare ourselves for ... disease threats to humans," Nathan Wolfe has set out to prove that this is not Mission Impossible. read more |
Are better tools needed to identify emotional distress in non-Western refugees?
With their lives hanging in the balance, Iraqi
refugees, like other dislocated populations, are at risk for severe
mental health problems such as post-traumatic stress disorder,
depression, substance abuse, or suicide. But as overstretched and
underfunded resettlement agencies struggle to help them, the symptoms
of deep problems may slip by unobserved and untreated. HSPH doctoral student Carmel Salhi is working to address this public health challenge. read more |
Flexible support for HSPH researchers
 In the 1990s, researchers on the Harvard Six Cities Study discovered that people living in cities with higher air pollution were dying at a faster rate than those in cleaner cities. This long-term study would not be easily replicated. However, the researchers were able to use the Department of Environmental Health's flexible funds to undertake a new analysis of data from the American Cancer Society. Together, these two studies validated each other and dramatically changed the policies for air pollution control in the United States and the world. Donating unrestricted funds provides flexible money that can be used at a critical point in a research project. Make an unrestricted gift to support researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health.
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@HSPHNews
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HSPH responds to Haiti earthquake
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HSPH faculty members are part of a joint
effort with Brigham and Women's Hospital to manage a medical
displacement camp on the border of the Dominican Republic and Haiti. Read more about this and other efforts. If you are an HSPH alum contributing to Haiti relief efforts, or know of other alumni not mentioned in this story, please let us know. |
New HSPH poll finds voter anger drove Mass. election
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Dissatisfaction with the direction of the country, antipathy toward
federal-government activism and opposition to the Democrats'
health-care proposals drove the upset election of Republican senatorial
candidate Scott Brown in Massachusetts, according to a post-election
survey of voters.
read more |
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