Health Affairs

Overuse of antibiotics and antibiotic resistance are serious problems that many people seem unaware of. Witness those who go into a physician’s office with a bad cold and insist upon being prescribed an antibiotic. A cold is caused by a virus, and antibiotics are ineffective on viruses. In today’s post, GrantWatch Blog looks at some... Read the rest of this entry »

This blogger, a former president of a foundation, writes that the value of public health infrastructure is sometimes forgotten. Investing in our public health infrastructure saves lives. That’s the bottom-line message of a recent Health Affairs article entitled Evidence Links Increases in Public Health Spending to Declines in Preventable Deaths. Its authors lay out the... Read the rest of this entry »

Below we have listed the three most-read posts. Take a look in case you missed them when the original tweets and e-alerts mentioning them were sent out. 1. “Southern Foundations Discuss PACE: Comprehensive Care to Help Elderly Age in Place,” by Tina Markanda (May 6). Markanda, a program officer at the Duke Endowment, writes about... Read the rest of this entry »

“Philanthropy at the Intersection of Health and the Environment,” by Karla Fortunato and Kathy Sessions of the Health and Environmental Funders Network (HEFN), was released earlier this month in the May issue of Health Affairs, a thematic issue on “environmental challenges for health.” The Kresge Foundation provided funding for the journal issue on this important... Read the rest of this entry »

We list below the three most-read posts during the month. Take a look in case you missed one of these when the original tweet or e-alert went out. 1. “Foundation Blogs Round-up: Health Reform, Disparities, Global Health, Obesity, and More,” by Lee-Lee Prina (Feb.17, 2011). Heading the top-three list is a round-up (selected sampling) of... Read the rest of this entry »

I have rounded up a list of recent posts from health philanthropy blogs and philanthropy-in-general blogs that caught my eye. For more blog reading, see GrantWatch Blog’s Blogroll (look to the right!). Environmental Health “Good Health Should Begin at Home, so Why Is Housing Making Kids Sick?” (Apr. 10). Ben Starrett tells us that “generations of chronic disinvestment in... Read the rest of this entry »

As my work week draws to a close, I have put together a quick listing of some foundation-related posts that I think you might want to check out. If your foundation has a blog about health care and it is not listed on GrantWatch Blog’s Blogroll, let me know about it! Disparities in Health: “Poll... Read the rest of this entry »

René Cabral-Daniels is the former director of the Public-Philanthropic Partnership Initiative at the Council on Foundations. She recently became chief of staff at the National Patient Advocate Foundation. If you define philanthropy as Council on Foundations President and CEO Steve Gunderson does—as “a strategic investment in social change,” it is clear that initiating and sustaining... Read the rest of this entry »

Grantmakers In Health’s (GIH’s) Fall Forum, held in November in Washington, DC, at the landmark Omni Shoreham Hotel, focused on women’s health. Here are some highlights. Alina Salganicoff of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation’s Menlo Park office mentioned some notable figures in the history of women’s health, such as the first lesbian TV character, who... Read the rest of this entry »

With First Lady Michelle Obama’s interest in fresh produce from the garden, we are reminded of how good it is, especially this time of year, to indulge in fresh fruits and vegetables. Check out this four-color magazine recently released by a foundation in Pittsburgh. The Heinz Endowments recently released the first “food issue” of its... Read the rest of this entry »

Using Political Tactics and Strategies at the State Level to Achieve a Ban on Smoking in Indoor Public Places and Workspaces  As a foundation committed to shaping health policy, we at the Sunflower Foundation made a decision to fund a public policy campaign as a special initiative, rather than a grant program, primarily because there was no nonprofit organization... Read the rest of this entry »

Some interesting items have come across my desk in recent months that you may want to check out. Reports: “Innovation in Action: Policies to Accelerate Development and Delivery of Global Health Tools,” Global Health Technologies Council, April 2010. The council is funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. This short policy report “examines the... Read the rest of this entry »

In today’s post I have pulled together a few items showing some foundation efforts in two areas: bioethics and environmental health. Bioethics The Arizona Bioethics Network is being relaunched. Saint Luke’s Health Initiatives (SLHI), a public foundation in Phoenix, is providing core funding. The network is “being reconfigured as a community of practice focused on ethical... Read the rest of this entry »