It is officially here, the beginning of 2009! With this New Year we make new resolutions and recommit to resolutions for which we have a long-standing promise. Last year, I made a commitment to improve our transparency and communications through this e-newsletter. I hope over the last year, you found the information shared here to be useful. We have received a number of positive comments from both newcomers and established members of our online CONNECTIONS community.

This year, we recommit to share our latest reports, programmatic activities, new initiatives, and success stories. I hope that you will engage with us and provide your feedback. Please share your ideas with me by e-mail at nchhstpdirector@cdc.gov

Warm regards and a Happy New Year!

Social Determinants of Health Consultation

CDC’s first external consultation on Social Determinants of Health and infectious diseases was held in Atlanta on December 9 and 10. Convened by NCHHSTP, the Consultation brought together leading academic, scientific, public health, and community partners with CDC experts to discuss how social determinants affect health and health outcomes.

Participants contributed valuable ideas regarding these factors in efforts to prevent and control HIV/AIDS, viral hepatitis, STDs, and tuberculosis.

The Consultation objectives included

1. Discussion of the role of social determinants in facilitating health disparities;
2. Creation of a comprehensive list of social determinants and associated strategies that can be systematically prioritized to accelerate the reduction of racial/ethnic and gender health disparities for diseases; and
3. Generation of Consultation proceedings to be used to guide short-term and long-term policy, programmatic, and research efforts.

The Consultation provided NCHHSTP stakeholders and CDC staff an opportunity to dialog about reducing health disparities and enhancing health equity, both related to the Center’s disease focus as well as in broader contexts.

Updated Condoms and STDs Fact Sheets

CDC’s recently published Updated Compendium of Evidence-Based Interventions offers eight additional evidence-based HIV prevention interventions. The new interventions include five best-evidence HIV behavioral interventions and three promising-evidence interventions. Four of the new interventions are for HIV-positive persons, including two brief, clinic-based interventions, two interventions for young, HIV-negative injection drug users, one for STD clinic patients, and one for African American fathers and their sons ages 11 to 14. Though the interventions are targeted to specific populations, most can be adapted for a variety of populations if the intervention’s core elements are retained.

The Updated Compendium is the most comprehensive source for targeted and evidence-based HIV prevention interventions in the United States. These behavioral interventions have been rigorously tested and found to increase protective behaviors or reduce sexual or drug-related risk behaviors for acquiring HIV infection.