SOUTH CHARLESTON, W.Va. — The state Department of Health and Human Resources held its first meeting of the new Public Health Impact Task Force Wednesday hoping to redefine the mission of public health in the state.
West Virginia ranks at or near the bottom in most health categories and state Chief Health Officer Dr. Rahul Gupta, who ran the meeting, said it wouldn’t be an overnight fix.
“I think one of the things we have to do is stop looking at one silver bullet solution,” Gupta said. “We have to look at comprehensive solutions and then put them in a policy and keep a checklist to say we’ve been able to do this but haven’t been able to do that.”
The task force hopes to revolutionize public health and impact the lives of West Virginians by positioning the state’s public health system to more effectively work with communities to improve health while addressing today’s health concerns. Gupta said that the widespread use of different kinds of tobacco is perhaps the biggest concern.
“We have issues with pregnant women tobacco use, with mental health and tobacco use, issues with non-tobacco products, chewing tobacco, and E-cigarettes,” he said.
He also cited obesity and drug abuse as two other problems that have to be resolved. Fayette County Health Department Administrator Danny Scalise was satisfied with the task force’s first meeting, but admitted the statistics given were alarming.
“I’m satisfied with the people that are at the table, there’s a good quality and a good mix of people that are part of the task force,” Scalise said. “I’m not satisfied with the statistics. Being number one usually should be a good thing, but being number one in some of the things Dr. Gupta talked about, we have to fix those issues.”
Scalise also said that it’s alarming that public health funding has decreased.
“One of the things that we need to worry about as local health departments is the funding issues that are coming up,” he said. “We can talk about these things all we want, but if at some point we don’t address the fact that funding is decreasing, we won’t be able to fix anything in a few years.”
The task force is made up of representatives from the Bureau for Public Health, local health departments, private and public partner organizations and policy makers.