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A
meaningful journey
When
Michael Johns spoke briefly at the Rollins School of Public Health
(RSPH) last spring, he had two titles in mind: "Better Late Than
Never" or "My Grandchildren Are Counting on You."
Some of Johns' grandchildren were
present as he received the 2006 Charles R. Hatcher Jr., M.D., Award for
Public Health. Established by the RSPH in 1996, the award honors faculty
members of the Woodruff Health Sciences Center (WHSC), who, through their
lifetime of work, exemplify excellence in public health. The award is
named in honor of Hatcher, former vice president for health affairs and
director of the WHSC and the first recipient of the award. The RSPH was
established as a school during Hatcher's tenure as vice president.
"Dr. Johns is the only current administrator
to get this award," noted James Curran, dean of the RSPH. "It
means a lot to be selected by the faculty and presented with this award
for your public health achievements."
Johns (pictured behind his grandsons) noted
that the Hatcher award acknowledged an important journey for him, personally
and professionally. As a child during the 1940s, Johns never gave a thought
to something called "public health." Yet he grew up enjoying
the benefits of clean water, an effective sewer system, vaccinations,
iodized salt, good nutrition, and lots of exercise (playing until dark).
As a medical student, he adhered to the medical model of dealing with
patients one at a time. His view of medicine changed over time as his
view of public health broadened. "I began to look at the world in
a whole new way," said Johns, who served as dean of Johns Hopkins
School of Medicine before joining the WHSC as executive vice president
for health affairs and CEO in 1996. Since then, he has contributed to
public health's increasingly broad influence.
During his tenure at Emory, Johns has led
the most extensive facilities improvement plan in its history. Highlights
include new buildings and facilities for biomedical research, a new nursing
school building, a new vaccine center, a new comprehensive cancer center,
a new pediatrics center, and the redevelopment of Emory Crawford Long
Hospital in midtown Atlanta. Currently, a new medical education building
is under construction, and planning is under way for a second building
for the RSPH. The buildings are part of Johns' strategy to position
the WHSC as one of the nation's preeminent academic health centers.
Last spring, the future of the world weighed
on Johns' mind after the christening of his fourth grandchild. "What's
the world going to be like when he grows up?" Johns wondered aloud
as he ticked off a list of concerns: pandemic flu, adequate food, safe
water, war, and the environment.
But he worries less when he thinks of how
RSPH faculty and students are working to change the world for the better.
"I smile because I know you are working to help our children and
grandchildren live a safer life than we have."
New
faculty appointments
The Rollins School of Public Health (RSPH) began the
academic year with several new faculty members on board.
Jerome Abramson, research
assistant professor of epidemiology, served as an assistant professor
in Emory's School of Medicine before joining the RSPH. Abramson's
research focuses on cardiovascular disease, especially in the areas of
oxidative stress and inflammation as risk factors for hypertension and
cardiovascular disease; the impact of depression and other psychological
factors on cardiovascular disease; and chronic kidney disease as a risk
factor for cardiovascular disease. With support from the NIH and the American
Heart Association, Abramson has conducted studies resulting in journal
articles on cardiovascular disease and prevention, including the epidemiology
and control of anemia, novel oxidative stress markers and C-reactive protein,
sex differences in recovery from coronary bypass surgery, and depression
and risk of heart disease.
Monique Hennink, Rollins
Associate Professor of Global Health, has been a lecturer and senior research
fellow at the University of Southampton since 1997. She has conducted
field research in Indonesia, Myanmar, Korea, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Australia,
and the United Kingdom, supported with funding from British, Nepalese,
and U.S. agencies and foundations. She has taught courses in demography,
research methods, fertility, and reproductive health. Her book, International
Focus Group Research: A Handbook for the Health and Social Sciences,
will be published by Cambridge University Press.
Assistant professor of biostatistics Brent
Johnson comes to Emory from a National Institute for Environmental
Health Sciences postdoctoral fellowship in biostatistics at the University
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His program of research includes statistical
methods. Examples include dealing with potentially confounding variables
in semiparametric regression analysis in longitudinal studies and variable
selection in semiparametric accelerated failure time model with statistical
applications in toxicology and nutrition studies. His articles have appeared
in the leading biostatistical methodology journals Biometrika
and Biometrics.
Frances McCarty is a research
assistant professor of behavioral sciences and health education. McCarty
has been collaborating with RSPH faculty as a staff member on several
research projects and, more recently, taught courses on research methods
for the Department of Behavioral Sciences and Health Education. She has
co-written more than 20 journals articles on studies of diet and obesity,
HIV transmission and adherence to drug regimens, epilepsy, research subject
recruitment, and early education program evaluation.
Venkat Narayan, Ruth and
O.C. Hubert Professor of Global Health, holds a joint appointment in the
Department of Epidemiology and Emory's Goizueta Business School.
He has taught courses on chronic disease epidemiology and prevention at
Aberdeen University and as an adjunct faculty member at RSPH. Since 1996,
Narayan served as chief of the diabetes epidemiology section and senior
research adviser with the Division of Diabetes Translation at the CDC,
where he led the world's largest diabetes outcomes cohort study
and a multicenter study of childhood diabetes. As a senior research fellow
at the NIH, he worked with the renowned Pima Indian cohort study of diabetes
and led the first lifestyle intervention study in this Native American
population. He has served on the editorial board of several journals,
including Annals of Internal Medicine and Clinical Diabetes.
Anne Spaulding joined the
RSPH as research assistant professor of epidemiology after several years
of practice regarding infectious diseases in prison populations. She has
served as medical program director for the Rhode Island Department of
Corrections; medical officer in HIV, STD, and TB prevention at the CDC;
and associate medical director for Georgia Correctional HealthCare. Her
journal articles have focused on HIV and hepatitis B and C and their management
in prison populations.
Lisa Tedesco, professor
of behavioral sciences and health education, also serves as vice president
and dean of Emory's Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. She was
recruited from the University of Michigan, where she served as the associate
dean in the School of Dentistry, interim provost, executive vice president
for academic affairs, and secretary of the university. She has extensive
teaching experience in the health applications of behavioral sciences
relating to dental services.
Michael Windle, Rollins
Professor and chair of the Department of Behavioral Sciences and Health
Education, comes to Emory from the University of Alabama at Birmingham
(UAB). While at UAB, he served as professor of psychology, director of
the Center for Advancement of Youth Health, director of the Comprehensive
Violence Center, and professor of pediatrics. The NIH, CDC, and other
agencies funded his research on adolescent health, particularly on consumption
of alcohol, violent behavior, and depression. At the center of his research
program is a longitudinal study tracking mental health and related health
risk behaviors of children through adolescence and adulthood. Windle is
the author of three books—Children of Alcoholics: Critical Perspectives
(Guilford Press, 1990), The Science of Prevention: Methodological
Advances from Alcohol and Substance Abuse Research (American Psychological
Association, 1997), and Alcohol Use Among Adolescents (Sage,
1999). He has served on the editorial board of leading journals in his
field, including Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, Psychology
of Addictive Behaviors, Health Psychology, and Developmental
Psychology.
Tianwei Yu, assistant professor
of biostatistics, has studied biochemistry and molecular biology in the
United States and in China. His research involves the application of statistical
methods to biological investigations, focusing on expression array/SNP
array data analysis, biological sequence analysis, alternative splicing,
transcriptional regulation, and sample size estimation for microarray
studies. He taught introductory statistics and courses in bioinformatics
and genomics at UCLA. He will support the Woodruff Health Sciences Center
regarding bioinformatics and statistical collaborations in biological
research.
Generating
rewards for safe water
For
40% of the world's population, the lack of adequate sanitation remains
a primary health concern for communities with limited resources to address
the problem.
Christine Moe, associate professor in the
Hubert Department of Global Health, and her colleagues strive to assist
nations with new ideas for sanitation through the Center for Global Safe
Water (CGSW).
The World Bank's Development Marketplace
recently recognized her project in Bolivia and another CGSW project in
Kenya as winners of the 2006 Global Competition. This grant program funds
30 winners around the world who share $5 million for innovative, small-scale
projects that can generate income for local businesses to increase knowledge
about and access to clean water and improved sanitation.
The Bolivia project also won the World Bank
Infrastructure Award. The recipient is selected based
on voting by World Bank infrastructure staff.
Moe's project will assess sanitation
behaviors and attitudes in Bolivian communities to identify key "selling"
points that relate to household latrine usage.
"The people there are more concerned
with safety, privacy, and dignity than with health concerns," she
says. "But as quality of life goes up, we want it to lead to that."
Moe and research coordinator Robert Dreibelbis,
05MPH, are collaborating with the Georgia Institute of Technology to build
solar latrines that will use heat generated from the sun to kill pathogens
in excreta. Tech's experts will help implement this safer and healthier
latrine system, allowing residents to maintain a suitable sanitation system,
Moe says.
Access to safe sanitation facilities is
among the most effective ways to reduce diarrhea morbidity and mortality,
which in Bolivia is among the highest in the Western Hemisphere. So far,
efforts to increase sanitation coverage have been slow, with households
expected to adopt a single, one-size-fits-all technology that does not
accommodate every household's needs, budgets, or demands.
"With the implementation of these
latrines, we stimulate a money-making business that supplies dry sanitation
that is aesthetically acceptable and easy to maintain," Moe says.
Moe is working with the Fundacion Sumaj
Huasi Para la Vivienda Saludable in Bolivia and the CDC, and the information
gathered in her assessments will help create acceptable, affordable, and
effective latrine options and generate demand for sanitation services
in local communities. Small businesses will be established to train workers
in latrine construction, sanitation promotion, and marketing of waste-based
fertilizers.
The Bolivia project looks to develop "home
depots for sanitation," offering lots of latrine models at different
prices. Moe's team estimates that 200 families will adopt the new
sanitation method over two years.
The second winning World Bank marketplace
proposal builds on the existing Rotary Safe Water Project in Kenya's
Nyanza Province. The goal is to decrease water-related illnesses and generate
income for rural women, who are members of HIV/AIDS self-help groups,
through the sale of affordable household water treatment and safe storage
products. Partners in this effort include the CGSW, the Rotary Club of
Atlanta, and the CDC.
Their project aims to mobilize 700 women's
groups to teach other women about the approaches they can use for safe
water, establish 1,500 vendors to distribute 25,000 affordable water treatment
products per month, and give 200,000 people a safe water solution.
Currently, about 75% of Nyanza's population
rely on unsafe water sources to meet their daily needs; use of this unsafe
water causes diarrhea that claims the lives of many young children and
AIDS victims. Poor roads make delivery of preventive household water treatment
and safe storage products difficult, and many women in these communities
live on less than 50 cents a day. By implementing the Kenya project, these
products can treat up to 1,000 liters of water for two months at a time
and be distributed at a cost of 26 cents each.
Trish Anderson, 04MPH, CGSW project coordinator
in Nyanza Province; Richard Rheingans of the CGSW at the RSPH; and Rob
Quick of the CDC lead the Kenya project.
Donors to the 2006 Development Marketplace
include the Global Environment Facility, the International Finance Corporation,
the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Global Village Energy Project,
and the Atlanta Rotary.—Jennifer Williams
Foege
honored for humanitarian efforts
The National Foundation for Infectious Diseases has named
William Foege as the 2007 recipient of the Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Award
for Humanitarian Contributions to the Health of Humankind. Foege is Presidential
Distinguished Scholar and professor emeritus in the Hubert Department
of Global Health. He is also a fellow with the Bill & Melinda Gates
Foundation's Global Health Program.
Foege's lifelong commitment to improving
worldwide public health and his courageous public health leadership in
the areas of child survival and development and injury prevention are
credited with saving millions of lives and vastly improving the quality
of life for millions of others, particularly in developing countries.
The Carter Humanitarian Award honors individuals
for such efforts. The award is named for President and Mrs. Carter, who
have worked tirelessly to improve quality of life for people worldwide.
Foege joins a distinguished group of past
award recipients, including Bill and Melinda Gates, Ted Turner, General
Colin Powell, former President Bill Clinton, Senator John D. Rockefeller
IV, former CDC director David Satcher, and the Carters, among others.
In 2002, the Gates Foundation established
the William H. Foege Fellowships in Global Health at the Rollins School
of Public Health (RSPH) in honor of Foege's career and achievements. Supported
by a $5 million endowment, the program brings four Foege Fellows from
developing countries each year to study at Emory, where they develop partnerships
with mentors at the CDC, The Carter Center, the Task Force for Child Survival
and Development, and CARE USA.
As director of the CDC from 1977 to 1983,
Foege was recognized for a humanitarian vision that all people, regardless
of economic status, nationality, or age, should live long and healthy
lives. Early in his career, he worked as a medical missionary in Eastern
Nigeria, where he developed a surveillance and containment strategy that
changed the worldwide approach to smallpox vaccination. This strategy
eventually led to the disease's eradication in the 1970s under Foege's
leadership as director of the CDC's Smallpox Eradication Program.
Foege later served as the first executive
director of the Task Force for Child Survival and Development, which helped
raise general immunization levels of the world's children from 20%
to 80% in just six years and created a successful program to overcome
river blindness.
Prior to joining the RSPH in 1997, Foege
served The Carter Center as executive director, fellow for health policy,
and executive director of Global 2000, which dramatically improved farming
practices, increased agricultural yields in developing countries, and
embarked on eradication of Guinea worm.
Foege is the recipient of numerous awards,
including the Mary Woodard Lasker Award for Public Service in Support
of Medical Research and Health Sciences in 2001. The award, often referred
to as "America's Nobel," recognized Foege for public
health leadership and his pivotal role in eradicating smallpox and preventing
river blindness.
Honoring
a family's legacy to global health
March
30 was a day like no on other as the Rollins School of Public
Health (RSPH) dedicated the Hubert Department of Global Health, the first
solely named department on the Emory campus and the first such named department
among the nation's schools of public health.
It was also a day to honor O.C. and Ruth
Hubert and their family, for whom the school named the department in recognition
of their generosity. When O.C. died at in 1986, he was the largest private
individual owner of property in Cobb County, Georgia. In accordance with
his wishes, the bulk of his estate was to be used to help others, but
not until his wife's death. But as Ruth told her family, she did
not want to be "an impediment to the charitable purposes"
she and O.C. planned.
The result today is the Hubert Foundation,
which is led by her son, Richard (Dick) Hubert. Support to date from the
foundation, which has given and pledged $10 million to the RSPH, doubled
the endowment for the O.C. Hubert Fellowships in International Health,
allowing more students to travel overseas to conduct field research. It
established two chairs—the William H. Foege Chair of Global Health,
held by Keith Klugman, and the Ruth and O.C. Hubert Chair in Global Health,
held by Venkat Narayan—and created the Richard N. Hubert Fund for
Global Health Excellence to support new and innovative approaches to solving
the world's health challenges.
During the dedication of the Hubert Department
of Global Health, Dick expressed his thanks to the RSPH for enabling his
family's foundation to meet its mission of caring for people who
are hungry or sick. "You are as important to us as we are to you,"
he said. "You have the expertise to accomplish the high purpose
of our mission and the sensitivity to deal with a global world."
The work of the RSPH and the Hubert family's
desire to improve quality of life worldwide make for a good fit. "The
fact is that we can always find a niche and, I hope, make a difference,"
Dick told guests, including his mother, now 97. "We cannot do that
unless we have people who are willing to be trained and go into the field.
It is a question of dedication and a question of training, and the Rollins
School of Public Health does that.
"When we looked through my father's
papers after his death, we found his visa to Ethiopia—he wanted
to find some way to do directly what we are doing," Dick noted.
"I do it in his name, I do it in the family's name, and I
thank you very much for your effort to what I think is a common and worthwhile
goal."
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