Every health care provider—from pediatrician to geriatrician—has seen how hunger and homelessness affect health. The disordered lives of patients disrupt appointment-keeping and medication adherence but also create problems themselves. For example, they drive depressive symptoms, high blood pressure, and hospitalizations for asthma.
 
Recognizing this, some health systems are paying attention. Our health system in Boston recently announced plans to subsidize housing to improve housing options for patients for whom it is accountable. 

According to a new study, there was little discussion by candidates Trump and Clinton of “public health issues” during the 2016 Presidential campaign. 
 
Combing the texts of major campaign speeches, interviews, and advertisements made by candidates Trump and Clinton for keywords, the authors of this study conclude, “the two candidates did not communicate the major concerns of the public health field.” They bemoan that general references to “health” accounted for less than 1% of the words used by these candidates.

Pre-tax incomes for the poorest 50 percent of Americans have stayed mostly unchanged for the past 40 years. As our economy has grown, the pre-tax share of national income among the poor has dropped significantly, widening income gaps in the country. We leave the question of why inequality matters for the economy to others. What is of concern to us is whether income inequality matters to our health and to the extent that it does, how we in the health profession should respond. 

Quietly, slowly, there has been a notable change in how young Americans relate sexually with each other. Between 1995 and 2015, the proportion of high school students who report ever having sexual intercourse has fallen from 53.1% to 41.2%, the lowest rate since the 1970s. If these percentages were moving in the opposite direction, the headlines would announce how “discouraged” we were by this next generation putting themselves at risk for pregnancy, infection. Good news does not travel as fast as bad news does. So if you were looking for positive public health reports, this is one.

Welcome.

This is a new venture for us. Our mission is to bring attention to the public’s health with our weekly newsletter The Public’s Health. Our interest is two-fold: to understand threats to the public’s health and to promote well-being. We aim to give influencers, policymakers, and deciders the information you need to move all of us toward being healthier.