Summer 2006, Volume 11 Number 3

Table of Contents

What is the prescription for improving our nation’s health?  Dr. Stephen Bezruchka’s solution is to produce a caring and sharing society from “womb to tomb” (KIDS article, Winter 2006).  The prescription includes the development of economic, social, and political policies that will reduce inequalities because evidence shows that egalitarian societies are healthier societies.  

Several years ago, Bezruchka and his colleagues from the Population Health Forum (http://depts.washington.edu/eqhlth/pages/about.html) started introducing these ideas in a few Seattle middle and high schools.   In the summer of 2005, four of Bezruchka’s colleagues took the next step – forming the Population Health Project (PHP) to educate youth and adults about the structural conditions that affect health, and to promote social action leading to equity for all.   The PHP focuses on developing, teaching, and disseminating a population health curriculum for secondary school students. The curriculum engages youth in learning about links between social justice and health equity, and is using this knowledge to become strong advocates for social change.

The population health curriculum moves health education beyond a narrow focus on individual behaviors to one that teaches students about how health is produced in a society through collective actions that benefit groups of people as well as individuals.   PHP’s lessons, discussions, and assignments provide students with tools for understanding how health and inequality are measured, and how health is related to inequality and to other social determinants. Issues of community health and social well-being are framed in terms of civic engagement, emphasizing the importance of taking action to make positive social changes.  PHP employs civic engagement activities, which may include writing letters to elected officials, raising public awareness about important issues through art, or planting a community garden.

Last year PHP designed and piloted a series of lessons about food security to complement and expand upon existing health and nutrition lessons.  This year two additional curriculum modules were developed and piloted.  Andra DeVoght developed a semester-long course on Global Health and Art Activism, co-taught with an art instructor.  This course addressed the root social and political causes of world health issues through art activism.  Linn Gould developed and taught lessons which introduced the concept of environmental justice and addressed the disproportionate impacts of environmental contamination on low income and minority communities.

The PHP is working to develop a population health curriculum teachers’ manual.  The manual will provide an introduction to the concepts and measurement of inequality and health and will include modules on civic action; food security; globalization; environmental justice; social cohesion; urbanization; early childhood development; health system policies; employment; and immigration.   PHP believes that if it can educate U.S. youth to think critically about and respond to connections between local and global economies and the health of societies, they will be better prepared to be well-informed, active participants in our democracy.
            Andra DeVoght, PT, MPH; Alison Eisinger, MSW; Linn Gould, MS, MPH; and Liz Mogford, MPH all live and work in the Seattle area.  They can be reached at pophealthproject@gmail.com.  You can also visit their website at www.populationhealthproject.org

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