From the Dean

Our cover story features the commu-nity-oriented work of the Harlem Center for Health Promotion and Disease Prevention, which operates with the express purpose of reducing excess mortality and morbidity in Harlem. For seven years it has been vitally involved in activities ranging from adolescent pregnancy prevention and cardiovascular disease reduction to child injury prevention and prostate cancer research. By acknowledging the problems in the Harlem community, assessing its needs, and forging community partnerships, the Center aims to influence public policy and to restore and promote good health to a community that continues to contribute so much to the nation.

Funded by the CDC’s Prevention Research Center program, it operates through a three-way collaboration—CDC, CSPH and Harlem Hospital Center—and is the only such center with an urban, African-American focus. The research and demonstration projects supported through this program provide examples of approaches to improve our nation’s ability to prevent disease and promote health, thereby reducing the burden of disease and suffering and, hopefully, also curtailing the climbing costs of medical care.

While health promotion and disease prevention spending tends to be a good investment, the federal government dedicates only one percent of its health care dollars to public health. A major priority for our School and for the Association of Schools of Public Health is to significantly increase federal funding support for prevention-oriented research and services. A particular focus will be on increased support for the Prevention Research Centers, for which appropriation levels have been inadequate, currently about fifty percent of the original authorized amount when the program was instituted over a decade ago.

To help mount needed interventions in low-income communities of color such as Harlem, CSPH faculty members conduct meaningful prevention research and publish their findings. This requires funding support. Fortunately, private citizens sometimes step in to fill the financial gaps. That’s the case with Professor Anna Gelman, a devoted CSPH educator and researcher, who has endowed The Anna Cheskis Gelman and Murray Charles Gelman Professorship in Public Health (Epidemiology). Her story is on page 4. Other recent financial support for the School has come from one of America’s best known businesspeople, Bill Gates. Details are in the Development section.

This issue also includes feature stories highlighting the School’s highly successful executive M.P.H. program, founded and directed by Health Policy and Management’s Sheila Gorman, and the wide-range of breast cancer research being conducted by CSPH faculty. In addition, we are pleased to publish an editorial by New York State Commissioner of Health Barbara DeBuono on efforts to expand health insurance coverage for children. The Commissioner was the recipient of a Dean’s Distinguished Service Award at this year’s commencement.

Allan Rosenfield, MD
Dean