Naomi Bloch attended last evening’s meeting of the Montgomery County African Affairs Advisory Group representing the Trachtenberg Office.
The guest speaker was Brenda Lockley, R.N, M.S., and Program Manager of the African American Health Program within the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Minority & Multicultural Health. Ms. Lockley updated the Group on all of the various efforts being done to address the health disparities that exist within this community with regard to infant mortality rates as well as other life-style related concerns.
Ms. Lockley also said that, due to the current budgetary challenges facing the Department, they have also decided to develop a new strategy will be more sustainable toward achieving and maintaining good health in this community. The five points emphasized in this new approach are: 1) Social Determinants; 2) Access to Competent Care; 3) Wellness & Prevention; 4) Ways to Increase Community Involvement; and 5) Better Data Collection & Monitoring
Ms. Lockley gave the website for getting further information: http://www.onehealthylife.org/
Other topics discussed in the meeting were the importance of developing better outreach strategies into the various African communities in order to get everyone counted in the 2010 Census.
There is presently one Census outreach program scheduled for January 31, 2010 to take place at: Bethel World Outreach Ministries, 8242---52 Georgia Avenue, Silver Spring, MD 20910, Phone 301 588 8099, fax 301 588 4947
Finally, they revisited an ongoing discussion and goal of the Group’s to eventually be able to open an African Community Center somewhere in Montgomery County. It was decided that they needed to form a small sub-committee to develop both a short-term and long-term strategy to be presented to the Group in a future meeting. The attendees voted on three members as a start to this committee with the goal to reach out and add additional partners as the plan developed further on this project.
No comments:
Post a Comment