Announcements

 Join CDC’s Office of Health Equity (OHE) to learn about current guidance to protect your communities from COVID-19, RSV, and flu this fall and winter. Topics will include key information about these conditions, prevention and vaccination guidance to help protect groups at highest risk for serious illness, and information about CDC’s efforts focused on health and vaccine equity. Presenters include OHE leadership and subject matter experts from CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases (NCIRD).

This live streamed Zoom event will be held on Monday, October 30 at 11:30 am – 12:45 pm ET. More information about this event and how to register is available on the event webpage.

CDC’s Office of Health Equity (OHE) shares that Hazel D. Dean, ScD, DrPH (Hon), FACE, FFPH has been selected to serve as director, Office of Equitable Population Health and CAPT Carolina Luna-Pinto has agreed to serve as acting director, Office of Minority Health.

Since June 2023, Dr. Dean has served as director of the Office of Equitable Population Health in CDC’s Office of Health Equity In this role, she provides leadership in developing CDC’s long-range plans for populations that have been historically marginalized and underserved and who experience a disproportionate burden of premature death, preventable injury and disease. In conjunction with this position, she continues to serve as the 25^th Editor-in-Chief of the journal, Public Health Reports (PHR), the official, scientific journal of the Office of the Surgeon General and the US Public Health Service. Under her exceptional leadership, PHR saw notable growth, including the largest journal impact factor increase in its history. In addition, Dr. Dean implemented new equity, inclusion, diversity, and accessibility approaches in journal practices; launched collections of PHR articles on racism and health, emerging viral epidemics, mental health and COVID-19; and established a new department on ethical dimensions of public health that focuses on the translation of and interface between public health ethics theory and practice.

Dr. Dean served in many leadership roles with a distinguished record of service and achievements. She is an international leader in health disparities and health equity research, policy and practice and has continually added to global scholarship on health equity science and policy. She has worked in public health at the local, state, federal, and international levels, and in nonprofit organizations. She previously served as the principal deputy director of CDC’s National Center for HIV, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention (NCHHSTP). In that position, she served alongside the center Director by sharing responsibilities for planning, direction, and management of NCHHSTP and for achieving health impact of public health surveillance, research, and programs for preventing and controlling HIV, viral hepatitis, other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), and tuberculosis. Prior to this position, she served as NCHHSTP’s first associate director for health equity and director of its Office of Health Equity.

Since July 2022, CAPT Luna-Pinto has held the position of Program Chief for the (former) Office of Minority Health & Health Equity at CDC where she led four teams focused on health equity science, infrastructure and capacity building, strategic initiatives, and providing technical assistance to CDC’s health disparities grant recipients. She is also building the infrastructure for the Office of Health Equity’s emergency response coordination efforts. Prior to joining the now Office of Health Equity, she was the Deputy Branch Chief for CDC’s Emergency Preparedness and Response Branch, which is part of the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases, Division of Preparedness and Emerging Infections. In her various roles at CDC and as a US Public Health Services officer, she has been fortunate to have contributed to the Agency’s mission through steady leadership, quick thinking, creativity, and resilience in many environments, assignments and deployments (e.g., H1N1, Haiti earthquake/cholera outbreaks, 2015 Zika virus outbreak, southwest border responses, MERS/Ebola outbreaks, and COVID-19 pandemic response) as part of the State, Tribal, Local, and Territorial Support Task Force, and in the COVID-19 Chief Health Equity Officer Unit.

CAPT Luna-Pinto will play a critical leadership role in standing up the new office – working collaboratively with the OHE leadership and other CIO and IOD leaders to chart the way forward to an enhanced enterprise-wide strategy for addressing health disparities and health inequities in communities of color, sustaining partnerships with national, state, and local minority-serving organizations, accelerating the implementation of evidence-based strategies that reduce health disparities, and serving as a key advisor on issues associated with improving health outcomes in racial and ethnic populations, among other essential contributions.

The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 was the first federal legislation to address access and equity for people with disabilities. This September, CDC recognized the 50th anniversary of the passage of the Rehabilitation Act. To honor this major milestone, CDC’s Office of Health Equity and National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities co-sponsored a U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS)-wide virtual event, The Power of Belonging: Understanding Ableism and Why Addressing it Matters. The webinar featured Tiffany Yu, disability influencer and disability representation speaker, and was attended by over 1,800 HHS employees.

During the event, speakers shared ways to value and elevate the lived experiences of people with disabilities, amplify disability inclusion in all aspects of public health, and combat ableism. Tiffany Yu defined ableism as, “A system of oppression where we devalue someone based on the way their body and or mind works,” and shared key ways to combat ableism. Furthermore, she guided some attendees along the path toward disability allyship, explaining that “Allyship means asking, ‘how can we ensure that we are placing equitable value on everyone?’” Attendees gained knowledge, shared insights, and considered next steps for prioritizing disability inclusion in their professional and personal lives.

This special event is one of a growing number of efforts at CDC to help public health professionals strengthen their understanding of and comfort with addressing the evolving needs of the disability community. “Achieving a sense of belonging and inclusion requires trust and sustaining relationships. We are committed to working with and supporting the disability community,” remarked CDC Director Mandy K. Cohen, MD, MPH, during her opening remarks. CDC strives to protect the health and wellness of all people, including those with disabilities; this large and diverse group comprises every age, gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status. CDC works across public health disciplines to improve disability inclusion and considerations for data monitoring systems, disease prevention and health promotion programs, and emergency preparedness and response efforts to meet the needs of people with disabilities.

Check out more highlights from this event on Twitter at @CDCHealthEquity.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), announced more than $8 million through 18 awards to train primary care medical students, physician assistant students, and medical residents in providing culturally and linguistically appropriate care for individuals with limited English proficiency and individuals with physical or intellectual and developmental disabilities. HRSA’s mission focuses on improving health care access for historically underserved communities, and these investments address critical gaps that can occur in health care training and impede access to care.

A 2022 survey of more than 700 physicians found that only 41 percent of respondents were ‘very confident’ about their ability to provide the same quality of care to people with disabilities as those without, and only 57 percent strongly agreed that they welcomed people with disabilities into their practices, leading researchers to conclude that improvements in medical education and training are needed to better prepare physicians to care for people with disabilities.

Individuals with limited English proficiency disproportionately experience poor health outcomes and often substandard provider experiences, including challenges understanding doctors’ questions and diagnoses and with reading and using prescriptions, referrals, and follow-up directions. A 2021 Kaiser Family Foundation survey found that, among Hispanic adults who completed the survey in Spanish, 35% said it is difficult to find a doctor who explains things in a way they can understand compared with 17% of those who completed the survey in English.

Awardees will focus on either disability, limited English proficiency, or both. A full list of awardees is available online.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health Office on Women’s Health, is launching a new challenge worth up to $1.8 million to organizations with successful innovative and life-changing approaches to address human trafficking prevention among women and girls in the United States. The challenge was announced at the HHS National Human Trafficking Prevention Summit.

The National Human Trafficking Hotline estimates that 26.7 million people were impacted globally by human trafficking in 2021. Human trafficking is a crime that exploits a person for compelled labor, services, or commercial sex acts. The challenge was created in alignment with the priorities highlighted in the White House National Action Plan to Combat Human Trafficking.

Learn more about this initiative on the HHS website.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), awarded nearly $11 million to 15 awardees to strengthen the health workforce by establishing new residency programs in rural communities.

Nearly 70 percent of areas designated as primary medical Health Professional Shortage Areas are in rural areas. Physician shortages, poverty, and geographic isolation contribute to a lack of access to care and poorer health outcomes for rural Americans. More than half of rural U.S. counties lack hospital obstetric services. In response to the declining access to rural maternal health care, three of the 15 awards will be used specifically to develop new family medicine residency programs with enhanced obstetrical training in rural communities. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has also been taking critical steps to advance health equity and access to care.

Visit the HRSA website for a detailed breakdown of the awards.