Healthy People 2020 sets new health targets for nation: New edition issued ========================================================================== * Teddi Dineley Johnson Federal health officials have released a much-anticipated 10-year agenda to help all Americans lead longer, healthier lives. Hailed by health leaders as an occasion to celebrate, the launch of Healthy People 2020 in December equips health professionals and the public with long-awaited new targets, new topic areas and an expanded Web-based platform that can be used to craft health promotion and disease prevention programs across the nation. Grounded in the principle that setting national objectives and monitoring progress can motivate action, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services-led initiative is the “public health roadmap and compass for the nation,” said Assistant Secretary for Health Howard Koh, MD, MPH, of HHS. “Today we stand as one community and one nation to celebrate the unity of purpose that is represented by Healthy People 2020,” Koh said at a Washington, D.C., news conference releasing the new health goals and objectives Dec. 2. “Each decade since 1980, we have mobilized the best public health talent possible to set overarching goals, identify topic areas and targets and promote the power of prevention.” Now in its fourth edition, Healthy People is released every 10 years and undergoes updates each time. Building on the ever-expanding scope of public health, Healthy People 2020 includes nearly 600 health objectives — up from 467 in Healthy People 2010 — and more than 1,300 measures to improve the health of all Americans. The resource also addresses 42 topics, including 13 new ones: adolescent health, blood disorders and safety, dementias, early and middle childhood, genomics, older adults, global health, quality of life, health care-associated infections, preparedness, sleep health, social determinants of health, and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender health. Emphasizing that the health of an individual is almost inseparable from the health of the larger community, the initiative sets overarching goals to attain longer, healthier lives; achieve equity; create healthy social and physical environments; and promote healthy behaviors, among others. Of the goals, addressing social and physical environments will be especially important for advancing the health of the population over the next decade and beyond, said APHA member Shiriki Kumanyika, PhD, MPH, associate dean for health promotion and disease prevention at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. “We believe that this is one of the most important developments of the Healthy People 2020 program,” said Kumanyika, who co-chaired a committee convened by HHS in 2008 to guide the development of the Healthy People 2020 objectives. The committee’s recommendations included feedback gathered from hundreds of state and local public health professionals who provided input to the Healthy People development process via online and regional meetings. In addition to new topic areas and objectives, Healthy People 2020’s newly redesigned, user-friendly website encourages public health professionals, academics and advocates to tailor the information to their own Healthy People programs and processes in their communities. Online at [www.healthypeople.gov](http://www.healthypeople.gov), the website will likely “make the biggest difference in your everyday use of Healthy People 2020,” said Penelope Slade-Sawyer, MSW, deputy assistant secretary for health, disease prevention and health promotion at HHS. Interactive and searchable, the website replaces the traditional print version of Healthy People and will be continually refined and improved as public health professionals across the country add to the knowledge base, said Slade-Sawyer, who was also on hand at APHA’s Annual Meeting in Denver in November to give meeting-goers an early look at Healthy People 2020’s new website and topic areas. ![Figure1](http://www.thenationshealth.org/http://www.thenationshealth.org/content/nathealth/40/10/1.2/F1.medium.gif) [Figure1](http://www.thenationshealth.org/content/40/10/1.2/F1) The Healthy People 2020 booth attracts attention at APHA’s 138th Annual Meeting in Denver. The new resource, released Dec. 2, was also the subject of scientific sessions at the meeting. Photo by Michele Late “We want to know where we are,” Slade-Sawyer said at the APHA meeting. “We want to get a vision of where we want to go and we want to mark our progress along the way.” Health departments, researchers, community health advocates and businesses are encouraged to use Healthy People 2020 as a roadmap to plan, implement and track their health improvement initiatives. In the past, some states and organizations have used the resource to create their own versions of Healthy People. Using the evidence-based interventions and implementing them will require collaboration, especially with nontraditional partners, said APHA member Jonathan Fielding, MD, MPH, MA, MBA, chair of the advisory committee that guided the development of the Healthy People 2020 objectives. “There is very little in public health we can do alone, but there is almost nothing we can’t do with the right partners, and this requires all the right partners,” said Fielding, who is director of the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health. For more information on Healthy People, visit [www.healthypeople.gov](http://www.healthypeople.gov). * Copyright The Nation’s Health, American Public Health Association