INSIGHT & INSPIRATION FROM APHA’S 2012 MIDYEAR MEETING

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Survive All In This Friends Prevention, Strategies
& Thrive Together For Health Opportunity & Equity for Health
Brave New (Public Health) World
Public health 2.0: It’s the future and it’s time to get on board. That was the message from presenter
Jay Bernhardt, a professor in the Department of Health Education and Behavior at the
University of Florida, who called on attendees to start — and continue — leveraging new social
and communications technology to improve people’s health.
First, Bernhardt provided a quick overview of today’s trends, which further illustrate that using
new media isn’t so much a choice anymore; it’s becoming key to successful public health
efforts. As expected, Internet use in the United States is very high, with young people using it
most, but other age groups steadily climbing. And understanding what people do when they
venture online is important as well. Social networking, watching videos, playing games, searching
for information — different age groups use the Internet for different reasons.
“The Internet is not a channel,” he told attendees. “It’s a diverse media platform that people do
all kinds of different activities on.”
However, Bernhardt cautioned that not all Internet access is created equal. To truly take advantage
of the Internet today, people must have home broadband (high-speed Internet connection),
he said, noting that dial-up access doesn’t offer nearly as rich of an experience. This digital
divide means that public health campaigns that rely solely on the Internet will be missing those
residents who can’t afford such access. The alternative, however, is mobile and cellular technology,
the fastest growing technology out there.
People use their cell phones for much more than phone calls; in fact, data shows that actual
phone calls are taking a back seat to text messaging. Bernhardt noted that households with cell
phones only — no landline — have gone up from 8 percent in 2005 to 27 percent in 2010. And
nearly half the cell phones sold in the United States are smartphones, which Bernhardt said
hold huge potential for public health.