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Public health workforce and education in California
Public health workforce and education in California
- Collection:
- Health Policy and Services Research
- Contributor(s):
- University of California, San Francisco. Healthforce Center, issuing body.
- Publication:
- San Francisco, CA : University of California, San Francisco, Healthforce Center, July 31, 2020
- Language(s):
- English
- Format:
- Text
- Subject(s):
- Education, Public Health Professional -- statistics & numerical data
Health Workforce -- statistics & numerical data
Health Workforce -- trends
California
United States - Genre(s):
- Technical Report
- Abstract:
- This report presents an overview of current and future supply and demand for California’s public health workforce. Public health professionals perform a wide range of services aimed at creating the conditions in which people can be healthy. Some public health professionals provide services to individuals, such as vaccination and education about healthy behaviors (e.g., education about the risks associated with consuming tobacco or alcohol). Others address community needs, such as investigating and treating outbreaks of communicable disease, providing access to nutritious foods and safe places to exercise, and enforcing safety standards in workplaces and sanitary standards in restaurants. Epidemiologists conduct research at a population level to identify risk factors and trends in the incidence and prevalence of disease. Still other public health professionals develop, implement and evaluate programs, systems and policies to improve health. The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the importance of the public health workforce and revealed a critical need for reinvestment in it. For example, California needs to substantially increase the number of contact tracers working with people who test positive for COVID-19 and those with whom they have had close contact to ensure that they have access to testing, medical care and other services that can reduce the spread of the virus. The public health workforce is usually defined in one of two ways. One definition encompasses all people who work for local, state or federal agencies that provide public health services, regardless of whether they have degrees in public health. The other definition includes all those who have bachelor’s, master’s or doctoral degrees in public health, regardless of whether they work for public health agencies. Neither definition is optimal. Many jobs for public health agencies do not require public health degrees, and many people with public health degrees do not work for organizations that provide public health services. For example, people with master’s degrees in public health who work for health systems or health plans.
- Copyright:
- Reproduced with permission of the copyright holder. Further use of the material is subject to CC BY license. (More information)
- Extent:
- 1 online resource (1 PDF file (7 pages))
- Illustrations:
- Illustrations
- NLM Unique ID:
- 9918383968106676 (See catalog record)
- Permanent Link:
- http://resource.nlm.nih.gov/9918383968106676