IANPHI and National Public Health Institutes

Public Health ◽  
2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ellen Whitney ◽  
Katherine Seib ◽  
Jessica Blackburn ◽  
Jacob Clemente ◽  
Courtenay M. Dusenbury ◽  
...  

More than one hundred countries around the world have established national public health institutes (NPHIs) to coordinate and lead their public health systems. Some NPHIs, such as the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), South African National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD), Brazilian Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (FIOCRUZ), and Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, have developed over time. Others, such as the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC), emanated in response to more recent global public health threats like severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS). NPHI functionalities range from combatting primarily infectious diseases to comprehensive mandates to lead national efforts for prevention and control of both infectious and noncommunicable disease threats. The International Association of National Public Health Institutes (IANPHI), envisioned in 2001 and chartered in 2006, serves to link and catalyze the capacity of NPHIs around the world through a robust international professional and scientific network. IANPHI works closely with the World Health Organization (WHO) through a formal partnership agreement. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, member dues and peer assistance, bilateral cooperative agreements, and private-sector partnerships support its activities. IANPHI’s members encompass more than five billion people across six continents. IANPHI is the only organization whose mission is to strengthen national public health institutes. To do this, IANPHI’s work focuses on (a) supporting a robust scientific community of NPHI directors through an annual meeting, a listserv, and collaborative activities; (b) developing and distributing guidelines and tools that strengthen NPHIs’ abilities to conduct and evaluate public health programs and efforts, including the IANPHI NPHI development framework, the Staged Development Tool, NPHI-to-NPHI evaluation guidance, and a best practices series; and (c) investing in projects designed to create NPHIs and strengthen public health systems in low-resource countries. IANPHI helps NPHIs by advocating for strong and well-supported NPHIs and providing timely information and insights for public health programs and actions.

Author(s):  
Mina Aghaei ◽  
Masud Yunesian

Although the vaccination has begun in many countries around the world, experts declare that there is a long way to go in coronavirus battle, and it will take a long time for the vaccine to have a significant effect.  Therefore many questions have arisen about “the necessity to keep taking health protocols” and “how long does it take for people to return to normal activities and reduce or even abandon health protocols after receiving the Covid-19 vaccine”. According to CDC (Centers for Disease Control and prevention) reports, significant immunity is expected to occur approximately 2 weeks after receiving the second dose of the vaccine, however getting the vaccine does not mean the end of public health and preventive measures, and all full vaccinated people need to keep taking all health protocols and precautions for the reasons discussed in this letter to editor.


10.2196/25108 ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. e25108
Author(s):  
Joanne Chen Lyu ◽  
Garving K Luli

Background The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is a national public health protection agency in the United States. With the escalating impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on society in the United States and around the world, the CDC has become one of the focal points of public discussion. Objective This study aims to identify the topics and their overarching themes emerging from the public COVID-19-related discussion about the CDC on Twitter and to further provide insight into public's concerns, focus of attention, perception of the CDC's current performance, and expectations from the CDC. Methods Tweets were downloaded from a large-scale COVID-19 Twitter chatter data set from March 11, 2020, when the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic, to August 14, 2020. We used R (The R Foundation) to clean the tweets and retain tweets that contained any of five specific keywords—cdc, CDC, centers for disease control and prevention, CDCgov, and cdcgov—while eliminating all 91 tweets posted by the CDC itself. The final data set included in the analysis consisted of 290,764 unique tweets from 152,314 different users. We used R to perform the latent Dirichlet allocation algorithm for topic modeling. Results The Twitter data generated 16 topics that the public linked to the CDC when they talked about COVID-19. Among the topics, the most discussed was COVID-19 death counts, accounting for 12.16% (n=35,347) of the total 290,764 tweets in the analysis, followed by general opinions about the credibility of the CDC and other authorities and the CDC's COVID-19 guidelines, with over 20,000 tweets for each. The 16 topics fell into four overarching themes: knowing the virus and the situation, policy and government actions, response guidelines, and general opinion about credibility. Conclusions Social media platforms, such as Twitter, provide valuable databases for public opinion. In a protracted pandemic, such as COVID-19, quickly and efficiently identifying the topics within the public discussion on Twitter would help public health agencies improve the next-round communication with the public.


2019 ◽  
Vol 4 (5) ◽  
pp. e001868 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Verrecchia ◽  
Osman Dar ◽  
Olaa Mohamed-Ahmed ◽  
Neil Squires

The strengthening of public health systems internationally is integral to the improvement and protection of global population health. Essential public health functions and services are provided for by a range of organisations working together, often co-ordinated and strategically led by national Ministries of Health. Increasingly, however, National Public Health Institutes (NPHIs) are being developed to better integrate and support the delivery of these services. In this paper, we outline the role of NPHIs, analyse their advantages and shortcomings, and explore their potential to deliver enhanced public health through collaborative networking as well as partnership with WHO.


2017 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 98-101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Colin W. Binns ◽  
Mi Kyung Lee ◽  
Masaharu Kagawa ◽  
Wah Yun Low ◽  
Qiu Liqian ◽  
...  

Nutrition is a major determinant of health throughout all stages of life and together with smoking is the most important risk factor for morbidity and mortality in the Asia Pacific Region. The workshop participants examined Dietary Guidelines and Food Guides that are in use in our region, together with additional materials from the World Health Organization, UNICEF and the World Cancer Research Foundation. The resulting set of guidelines is meant as a reminder of the main issues to be covered in a general public health education program. It may also be of value in reminding public health practitioners, educators, administrators, and policy makers of current nutrition issues. It may additionally be useful as a checklist of the issues to be considered in public health programs and regulations. The main areas of nutrition that are included in the Guidelines are eating a variety of foods, including vegetables, fruits, whole grain cereals, and nuts. Choose fish, poultry, and meats grown in a sustainable way. Appropriate growth, including avoiding obesity, and physical activity are important. Breastfeeding is the basis of infant nutrition and nutrition of mothers is an important public health measure. Negative factors in the Asian diet include salt, refined sugar, alcohol and fats. The APACPH Dietary Guidelines will need to be kept under review and modified to meet regional differences in food supply. The Guidelines will be useful as a checklist of the issues to be considered in public health programs, addressing both acute and chronic diseases.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claas Kirchhelle

COVID-19 has exposed significant differences in public health systems’ ability to mount effective test and trace responses. This article analyses the historical and structural reasons behind the relative success of Germany and the problems experienced in Britain and the US during the first wave of the pandemic. It also asks why recent international surveys overestimated Anglo-American preparedness. The article argues that the answer lies in the different evolution of public health systems as well as varying public health capacities at the local level. In Germany, post-1994 reforms of the decentralised public health system managed to overcome decades of political neglect and underinvestment and strengthen federal integration without compromising public health capacity at the state and communal level. This joint strengthening of the centre and hinterland allowed the Robert Koch Institute to function as an effective coordinating hub for locally tailored COVID-19 responses. By contrast, the decades after 1970 saw world-renowned Anglo-American public health systems face increasing challenges posed by funding cuts, privatisation, overambitious reforms, and increasing loss of political autonomy. Both the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Public Health England retained significant prestige, which resulted in an overestimation of capacity by international reviews. However, once centres in Atlanta and Colindale had been overwhelmed, there was little local and state public health capacity to fall back on.


2007 ◽  
Vol 22 (6) ◽  
pp. 473-477 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miguel A. Cruz ◽  
Ronald Burger ◽  
Mark Keim

AbstractOn 11 September 2001, terrorists hijacked two passenger planes and crashed them into the two towers of the World Trade Center (WTC) in New York City. These synchronized attacks were the largest act of terrorism ever committed on US soil. The impacts, fires, and subsequent collapse of the towers killed and injured thousands of people.Within minutes after the first plane crashed into the WTC, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia, initiated one of the largest public health responses in its history. Staff of the CDC provided technical assistance on several key public health issues. During the acute phase of the event, CDC personnel assisted with: (1) assessing hospital capacity; (2) establishing injury and disease surveillance activities; (3) deploying emergency coordinators/liaisons to facilitate inter-agency coordination with the affected jurisdictions; and (4) arranging rapid delivery of emergency medical supplies, therapeutics, and personal protective equipment. This incident highlighted the need for adequate planning for all potential hazards and the importance of interagency and interdepartmental coordination in preparing for and responding to public health emergencies.


Viruses ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (12) ◽  
pp. 2405
Author(s):  
Carlos A. Sariol ◽  
Crisanta Serrano-Collazo ◽  
Edwin J. Ortiz ◽  
Petraleigh Pantoja ◽  
Lorna Cruz ◽  
...  

The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic has impacted public health systems all over the world. The Delta variant seems to possess enhanced transmissibility, but no clear evidence suggests it has increased virulence. Our data show that pre-exposed individuals had similar neutralizing activity against the authentic COVID-19 strain and the Delta and Epsilon variants. After only one vaccine dose, the neutralization capacity expanded to all tested variants in pre-exposed individuals. Healthy vaccinated individuals showed a limited breadth of neutralization. One vaccine dose did induce similar neutralizing antibodies against the Delta as against the authentic strain. However, even after two doses, this capacity only expanded to the Epsilon variant.


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