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Set Future-Oriented Goals
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by William Foege, M.D.,
M.P.H.
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Distinguished Professor of International Health,
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Emory University School of Public Health,
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Senior Health Policy Fellow, The Carter Center
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It took almost 100 years before medical missions in foreign countries began
to think in terms of disease prevention. That long period of incubation
culminated in the remarkable story of what happened when a missionary reported
a case of smallpox in a small Nigerian outpost. Since the vaccination supply
was limited, the missionaries served as a surveillance team to report on
such outbreaks, and the small supply of vaccine was used to contain them.
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This shift from mass vaccination to surveillance containment changed the
strategy for smallpox eradication in the world.
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That was 30 years ago, and it has taken us that long in this country to
get to the same place. What are our opportunities now?
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First and foremost, train religious and public health professionals to
integrate their disciplines.
Second, annually update and continually inspire the next generation of
public health students.
Finally, encourage faith groups to do what CDC cannot do: advocate for
programs in public health. What if we lobbied for child-health programs,
for equity in mental health treatment, for anti-tobacco legislation, the
way the faith-based, hunger lobby Bread for the World advocated in 1985
against reducing child survival money in the U.S. budget? Forty thousand
letters to members of Congress not only reinstated the money the White
House had removed but also added $100 million more.
The challenge for the future is to unite the community of faith and the
community of public health in writing the history of public health for
the next thousand years.
We must keep the focus on health, not religious differences.
We must broaden our scope until there is no part of life beyond the interest
of public health workers.
We must find the resources, both public and private, to support faith/health
programs.
We must have impeccable science.
We must accept ambiguity, the messiness that is part of any movement, confident
that -- just as with evolution--what works gets repeated.
We do not know what stars look like today. All we know is what they looked
like a thousand or a million years ago, because that is what we see. Five
hundred years from now, people will know next to nothing about us, but
the world in which they live will be a direct result of what we do today.
We will continue to shine if we get it right.
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This article was reprinted with permission from "Faith & Health,"
Fall 1998.
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