Howard?s new health officer, Peter Beilenson, brings with him 13 years in public health leadership, having served as the Baltimore City health commissioner.
He also ran for Maryland?s District 3 congressional seat, losing to John Sarbanes in September?s Democratic primary.
The County Council officially approved him this week.
Q What made you decide to take this position as health officer?
A I was asked by the County Executive [Ken Ulman]. He just called me out of the blue. His selling point was he really wanted to make Howard County a model public health community, which is relatively unusual for a county executive.
Q How will your experience as Baltimore City health commissioner serve you in Howard County, which is a much different demographic?
A Interestingly, I believe I went from the fifth-poorest jurisdiction in the U.S. to the fourth- wealthiest county in the U.S. It really is different, [but] public health is all about assessing the needs of the community, developing policies to address those needs, and assuring those needs are met by what you did.
It?s the same paradigm.
There?s not a huge learning curve in knowing public health, but it?s getting to know the players [in Howard County].
I ran for Congress, and a large part of Howard County was in the district, so I know a lot of the people and places in Howard County.
Q What are the major health challenges facing Howard County residents?
A I think one of the other selling points oncoming here was that in Baltimore, we were basically reacting a lot of the time and dealing with the consequences of poverty and violence and substance abuse. Here there is a lot less, so we can focus on primary prevention.
It?s trying to prevent people from even beginning to have risk factors. As part of this model public health community, we will be trying to get healthy restaurants and healthy workplaces that do a variety of healthful menus and benefits and things like that.
It?s trying to get people from becoming obese or getting heart disease.
That is something very different from what we were focusing on in Baltimore.
Q You referenced the model health community. What is that?
A We are trying to encourage healthy behavior in as many walks of life as possible. For example, healthy restaurants, healthy homes, healthy schools.
For healthy homes, we will be working with families and getting information out to them about how to prevent falls, how to get carbon monoxide detectors in the home, how seniors can avoid medication errors, dealing with mold and lead and cockroaches.
We will announce specific initiatives in the next three or four weeks.
Q What is your child health agenda?
A It?s all under the umbrella of a healthy Howard. We will announce within the next three to four weeks outcomes we are trying to reach in terms of juvenile violence, child abuse, immunization rates, infant mortality and some injury prevention.
Some of it is site-based, and some of it is age group-based. We will be working with [the Department of] Citizens Services, and other governmental, public and private collaborators.
