Daily Recaps
Previous Recap: Day 1
ICUH Day 2, Thursday, October 28, 2010
Dr. Thomas Farley Speaks at 2010 ICUH
Dr. Jason Corburn, Associate Professor at the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley, spoke about the politics of urban planning and the significance of place-health relationships, especially in San Francisco, the regional focus of his work. Dr. Coburn advocated for healthy urban governance that looks at what contributes to health for all of a city's residents, centers around promoting health equity, involves robust community involvement, and incorporates science addressing policy and urban health issues. Dr. Coburn also described San Francisco's use of Health Impact Assessments (HIA's), which have identified community health objectives and indicators and have yielded new research on community conditions and improvement strategies.
Celeste de Souza Rodrigues, Secretariat of Planning for the city Belo Horizonte, Brazil, spoke about participatory budgeting and other innovations in addressing determinants of health in Belo Horizonte. The practice of participatory budgeting combines direct and representative democracy, giving the public the right to define priorities of public investments. This Belo Horizonte initiative has brought about a new model of government and led to the development of several initiatives with public health implications, improving the quality of life in the poorest regions.
This year, ICUH, in collaboration with the staff of the NYAM Library, hosted a series of special meetings with six visiting librarians from South Africa, Ghana, and Tanzania. The librarians were able to attend the conference through a generous grant from the Carnegie Corporation. The group met with the NYAM Library staff to discuss how they might collaborate on NYAM's Grey Literature Project, which catalogues and disseminates public health information that has not been published by traditional channels. The inclusion of public health research and materials from Africa that are hard to find and have likely never been shared anywhere would be a great boon to researchers, the public health workforce, clinicians, and other professionals.
NYAM Library Staff and Visiting Librarians Discuss Grey Literature Project
The conference continued throughout the day with oral and posters sessions, workshops, and film screenings. The oral session on racial disparities featured the first study to examine both explicit reports of racial discrimination and implicit racial bias in relation to cardiovascular health, entitled "Racial Discrimination, Implicit Racial Bias, and Cardiovascular Disease: Findings from the Bay Area Heart Health Study." Findings suggest that racial discrimination may have particularly deleterious consequences for hypertension among African American men who have internalized racist beliefs. In light of the pervasive nature of discrimination, results indicate that steps to promote a positive racial identity, through social, community, and individual-level approaches, may buffer the impact of racial stressors and improve cardiovascular health in this population.
Poster Session
The oral session on innovations in health financing included research from the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee on the incorporation of mobile technology in a program working to reduce maternal and child mortality in urban slums of Bangladesh. A mobile phone-based data collection system for health workers was found to facilitate quick risk identification for pregnant women, reduce data collection time by 50%, and cost less than the existing system.
A range of research on health and safety issues related to bicycle and pedestrian access in cities was featured in two oral sessions on active transportation. One such study, "Urban Cycling: A Study of Bicycle Lane Safety in Brooklyn, New York," identified motor vehicle and bicyclist behaviors that affect bicycle lane safety. Another, "Prevalence and Predictors of Use a City-sponsored Public Bicycle Share Program in Montreal, Canada: The Case of BIXI," is among the first research on factors determining use of public bicycle share programs, which have been implemented in over 50 cities.
Other topics explored in the day's sessions included urban health equity, HIV testing, immunizations, homelessness, health in all policies, and government-community partnerships. To view the full conference program and all research abstracts, please visit www.icuh2010.org.
Dr. Rice addresses ICUH 2010 Conference attendees
The previous evening, Dr. Susan Elizabeth Rice, United States Ambassador to the United Nations, welcomed more than 100 conference participants at a private reception held in the Delegates' Dining Room of the United Nations. In her remarks, Ambassador Rice thanked the attendees for their important contributions to the field of urban health while extolling the value of their work in addressing some of the most critical public health challenges facing the world's population. Ambassador Rice told the group their work is part of a much larger effort by many countries in concert with the United Nations through the Millennium Development Goals initiative created to "alleviate the scourge of extreme poverty."
Speakers at UN Reception
"More than one billion people - one in six around the world - live in urban slums, a number that will surely rise if urban planning processes fail to improve, if more sustainable environmental policies are not implemented, if nations cannot stem the tide of violence, famine, and inequality that drives so many people to desperately seek out opportunities in the developing world," Ambassador Rice said.
Previous Recap: Day 1
ICUH Day 2, Thursday, October 28, 2010
The overall theme of the second day of the International Conference on Urban Health at The New York Academy of Medicine focused on how cities have approached urban health, including case examples of New York City, San Francisco, and Belo Horizonte, Brazil.
Dr. Thomas Farley, Commissioner of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, began the day's program with a talk on the innovative approaches the city has taken in addressing the leading causes of mortality and morbidity among New Yorkers, including tobacco use and obesity. He detailed a wide range of successful health policies and initiatives implemented in New York City in the last decade, including the Smoke-Free Air Act, a ban on the use of trans fats in restaurants, mandated calorie labeling in fast food restaurants, and a public campaign against the consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages.
Dr. Thomas Farley Speaks at 2010 ICUH
Dr. Jason Corburn, Associate Professor at the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley, spoke about the politics of urban planning and the significance of place-health relationships, especially in San Francisco, the regional focus of his work. Dr. Coburn advocated for healthy urban governance that looks at what contributes to health for all of a city's residents, centers around promoting health equity, involves robust community involvement, and incorporates science addressing policy and urban health issues. Dr. Coburn also described San Francisco's use of Health Impact Assessments (HIA's), which have identified community health objectives and indicators and have yielded new research on community conditions and improvement strategies.
Celeste de Souza Rodrigues, Secretariat of Planning for the city Belo Horizonte, Brazil, spoke about participatory budgeting and other innovations in addressing determinants of health in Belo Horizonte. The practice of participatory budgeting combines direct and representative democracy, giving the public the right to define priorities of public investments. This Belo Horizonte initiative has brought about a new model of government and led to the development of several initiatives with public health implications, improving the quality of life in the poorest regions.
This year, ICUH, in collaboration with the staff of the NYAM Library, hosted a series of special meetings with six visiting librarians from South Africa, Ghana, and Tanzania. The librarians were able to attend the conference through a generous grant from the Carnegie Corporation. The group met with the NYAM Library staff to discuss how they might collaborate on NYAM's Grey Literature Project, which catalogues and disseminates public health information that has not been published by traditional channels. The inclusion of public health research and materials from Africa that are hard to find and have likely never been shared anywhere would be a great boon to researchers, the public health workforce, clinicians, and other professionals.
NYAM Library Staff and Visiting Librarians Discuss Grey Literature Project
The conference continued throughout the day with oral and posters sessions, workshops, and film screenings. The oral session on racial disparities featured the first study to examine both explicit reports of racial discrimination and implicit racial bias in relation to cardiovascular health, entitled "Racial Discrimination, Implicit Racial Bias, and Cardiovascular Disease: Findings from the Bay Area Heart Health Study." Findings suggest that racial discrimination may have particularly deleterious consequences for hypertension among African American men who have internalized racist beliefs. In light of the pervasive nature of discrimination, results indicate that steps to promote a positive racial identity, through social, community, and individual-level approaches, may buffer the impact of racial stressors and improve cardiovascular health in this population.
Poster Session
The oral session on innovations in health financing included research from the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee on the incorporation of mobile technology in a program working to reduce maternal and child mortality in urban slums of Bangladesh. A mobile phone-based data collection system for health workers was found to facilitate quick risk identification for pregnant women, reduce data collection time by 50%, and cost less than the existing system.
A range of research on health and safety issues related to bicycle and pedestrian access in cities was featured in two oral sessions on active transportation. One such study, "Urban Cycling: A Study of Bicycle Lane Safety in Brooklyn, New York," identified motor vehicle and bicyclist behaviors that affect bicycle lane safety. Another, "Prevalence and Predictors of Use a City-sponsored Public Bicycle Share Program in Montreal, Canada: The Case of BIXI," is among the first research on factors determining use of public bicycle share programs, which have been implemented in over 50 cities.
Other topics explored in the day's sessions included urban health equity, HIV testing, immunizations, homelessness, health in all policies, and government-community partnerships. To view the full conference program and all research abstracts, please visit www.icuh2010.org.
Dr. Rice addresses ICUH 2010 Conference attendees
The previous evening, Dr. Susan Elizabeth Rice, United States Ambassador to the United Nations, welcomed more than 100 conference participants at a private reception held in the Delegates' Dining Room of the United Nations. In her remarks, Ambassador Rice thanked the attendees for their important contributions to the field of urban health while extolling the value of their work in addressing some of the most critical public health challenges facing the world's population. Ambassador Rice told the group their work is part of a much larger effort by many countries in concert with the United Nations through the Millennium Development Goals initiative created to "alleviate the scourge of extreme poverty."
Speakers at UN Reception
"More than one billion people - one in six around the world - live in urban slums, a number that will surely rise if urban planning processes fail to improve, if more sustainable environmental policies are not implemented, if nations cannot stem the tide of violence, famine, and inequality that drives so many people to desperately seek out opportunities in the developing world," Ambassador Rice said.
Previous Recaps: Day 1
