Public Health

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's brave and provocative new plan to prohibit sales of large soft drinks would seem to promote public health at minimal cost to residents. It looks like the kind of tough regulatory action the nation needs to combat an obesity epidemic that could make this generation of schoolchildren the first in centuries to have a shorter average life span than their parents.   As a physician who has written extensively about the unconscious forces that cause people to overeat, I believe governments should pursue bold initiatives to fight obesity.

A free public program on the effects of terrorism on public health and mental health will be presented at the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, 19 S. 22d St., at 5:30 p.m. Sept. 5. John Domzalski, Philadelphia public health commissioner, will moderate the event, which will feature Marci Layton, the assistant commissioner for communicable disease in the New York City Department of Health, and Elisabeth Young-Bruehl, a faculty member of Columbia University's Center for Psychoanalytic Training and Research.

Residents now can see the final report of the study done for Delaware County by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health on the delivery of public-health systems. The county has made available copies of the more-than-100-page document at the Office of Intercommunity Health in Room 117 of the government center in Media. The smaller, five-page executive summary has been posted on the county's Web site. To read the report, visit www.philly.com/delcohealth. By next Friday, copies of the report will be available for review at the 26 public libraries in the county.

HARRISBURG - Stop! In the name of the secretary of health! Eli N. Avila, Gov. Corbett's secretary of health, has ordered up new blue windbreakers on the taxpayers' dime, with Department of Health emblazoned on the front and back. The windbreakers, for Avila and his executive staff, also display the state seal on a retractable flap. In all, the Health Department said, nine of the windbreakers have been ordered, at a cost to the state of $553.82. Avila also dipped into his own pocket this year to have a badge made for himself, with Secretary of Health around the state seal - until Corbett's office nixed this idea.

A rapid home test for HIV, similar to early pregnancy tests, will be considered by a federal advisory committee on Tuesday, a move that many public health experts believe could eventually help calm Americans' fears of HIV, leading them to view it as just another serious chronic illness. An over-the-counter test offers new hope against an epidemic whose numbers in the United States have hardly budged in more than 15 years. An estimated 50 percent to 70 percent of the more than 50,000 new HIV cases annually are transmitted by people who were unaware that they were infected.

Delaware County's public-health system lacks coordination and leadership, and needs both to increase residents' awareness of programs and to improve some lagging health trends, a study by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health concluded. The study, commissioned by the county in 2008, was designed to look at the delivery of public-health services, identify gaps in coverage, and make recommendations to remedy shortfalls. Last year, the Hopkins investigators met with 11 public-health organizations in the county to get a general sense of public health, and sent out a short survey for residents.

Harvard University professor Jonathan M. Mann, an expert on human rights and the world AIDS epidemic, has been named dean of the fledgling School of Public Health at Allegheny University Hospitals in Philadelphia. Mann, 50, a physician and former director of the World Health Organization's global AIDS program, will assume the post on Jan. 1, Allegheny officials announced yesterday. "Our school's mission and role complement [Mann's] own personal goal of collaborating with the region's political and social leaders to achieve measurable improvements of people's well-being," said Allegheny provost Leonard Ross.

The latest appointee to the Street administration is Dr. Walter H. Tsou, who will take the helm at the Department of Public Health on April 26, Mayor Street announced yesterday. Tsou is Montgomery County's medical director and is deputy director for personal health services. During his tenure, Tsou helped create the county's first public health department and launched efforts to immunize all 7th graders against hepatitis B. Prior to working for Montgomery County, Tsou spent 10 years with Philadelphia health department, ending in 1991.

Randy Shilts, an openly gay journalist and the first to see the public- health crisis AIDS eventually would become, has died of the disease. Shilts' death comes at a time when AIDS seems to finally have been deemed worthy of notice by mainstream America. It is the subject of a hit Broadway play and the movie "Philadelphia," as well as the HBO rendition of Shilts' own acclaimed book on America's screwed-up response to the problem, "And the Band Played On. " At the same time, there is a growing epidemic of charges about the campaign to fight AIDS.

ALTHOUGH I've been a nonsmoker for 13 years, I believe the proposal to ban smoking in bars is absurd and will do little to improve public health. It may be news to Lawrence, but "cancer-causing chemicals" don't just "come with the job": They're part of living in Philadelphia. So, some suggestions for City Council if they're really concerned about public health: Start by forcing Sunoco and Rohm & Haas to stop polluting our air with cancer-causing emissions. Then force SEPTA to replace their diesel-belching buses with natural gas-powered buses like New York.