The new public health: vision for the future

On the fortieth anniversary of the Department of Social and Preventive Medicine, now renamed the Department of Community Health and Psychiatry, the contribution of the Department to the development of public health in Jamaica is briefly reviewed. The paper focuses on the challenges, goals and aspirations for the development of a "new" public health. The challenges include the need for more effective public health leadership, health promotion, better management of the health services and health reform. The latter should provide greater autonomy for the health regions and alternate ways of financing health, and should improve the quality of services provided. The Department is challenged to contribute by establishing a Public Health Residency Programme for doctors leading to a Doctor of Medicine or Doctorate in Public Health; to ensure that epidemiology becomes a basic science in the undergraduate medical curriculum, and that research plays a significant role in postgraduate training of clinical specialists; and to participate more actively in the actual practice of public health. A vision for health in the twenty-first century is given.