School Of Public

Dr. George Wills Comstock, an internationally known tuberculosis researcher and professor of epidemiology who established and headed the former Johns Hopkins Training Center for Public Health Research and Prevention in Hagerstown for 40 years, died Sunday of prostate cancer at his Smithsburg home. He was 92. Throughout his life, Dr. Comstock sought to inspire his students and colleagues with words that Horace Mann, educator and abolitionist, spoke in his 1859 commencement address at Antioch College: "I beseech you to treasure up in your hearts these my parting words: Be ashamed to die before you have won some victory for humanity."

An article in Tuesday's Maryland section incorrectly reported that researchers at Johns Hopkins Hospital proposed a study to determine whether heroin should be given to addicts to help prevent crime. The proposal was made by researchers at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health.The Sun regrets the error.Pub Date: 7/22/98

Dr. John Chandler Hume Sr., a former dean of the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health and an authority on the treatment of venereal diseases, died Monday of pneumonia at St. Agnes Hospital. He was 86.Dr. Hume was an outspoken advocate for financing and public education programs to halt the spread of venereal diseases.Soft-spoken, witty and known for his puns, Dr. Hume earned a reputation for being in love with his work."His mother used to say, 'I wish we could have just one dinner-table conversation without the subject of syphilis coming up,' " said his daughter, Susan H. Artes of Baltimore.

An anonymous donor has committed $5 million to the Johns Hopkins University for an addition to the university's School of Public Health in East Baltimore.The university announced yesterday that the gift from an alumnus of the Hopkins School of Medicine will pay for the bulk of a $6.2 million expansion of the public health school's Wolfe Street headquarters. The addition will nearly double the size of the Monument Street wing, which opened in 1996.Hopkins officials said construction will begin in April.

Roger C. Lipitz, a former health care entrepreneur who serves as chairman of the Baltimore Development Corp., will commit at least $1.5 million to endow a chair at the University of Maryland College Park devoted to strengthening ties between business and government, the university said yesterday.The commitment by Lipitz, which could grow to $3.5 million, will establish the chair in his name at the University of Maryland School of Public Affairs. The gift -- the largest ever received by the school -- will also help start the Roger C. Lipitz Center for Public Policy and Private Enterprise.

Due to an editing error, an article in last Thursday's editions about a proposal to create a school of public health at Morgan State University may have wrongly left the impression that the university would be the first to establish a school from a program. The second paragraph should have read:"Morgan State's move -- first to build a doctorate-granting program and then to create a separate school -- comes at a time when many campuses are under political and financial pressure to scale back their program."

Due to an editing error, an article in last Thursday's editions about a proposal to create a school of public health at Morgan State University may have wrongly left the impression that the university would be the first to establish a school from a program. The second paragraph should have read:"Morgan State's move -- first to build a doctorate-granting program and then to create a separate school -- comes at a time when many campuses are under political and financial pressure to scale back their program."

IT IS GOOD to see the cooperation that Morgan State University's quest to create a school of public health has received from Johns Hopkins University. Their collaboration is essential to making the dream a reality. But the task before Morgan is arduous.This nation's shift from traditional medical practice to managed care, emphasizing treatment of populations rather than individuals, has led to the creation of a number of new public health schools. But many are departments of existing schools of medicine, something Morgan doesn't have.

Guns have become so commonplace in the lives of U.S. children, a new survey says, that 59 percent of students from sixth grade through high school say they could get a handgun if they wanted one -- and a third of those say they could get one "within an hour."The survey, released yesterday by the Chicago-based Joyce dTC Foundation, also found that 15 percent of the students said they had carried a handgun in the past 30 days.Nine percent said they had shot a gun at someone."The poll shows that yesteryear's adolescent fistfight has become today's adolescent shootout," said Jay Winsten, director of Center for Health Communication at the Harvard School of Public Health.

Cops with guns. Gang members with guns. Women with guns. Cowboys with guns. The gunslingers are all over prime time television -- thrilling American children with their flash and power.Hollywood has helped glamorize guns, and now a group of public health officials wants Hollywood to help undo the damage.The Harvard School of Public Health is launching a five-year, $850,000 campaign to help change Americans' view of guns and violence. The lobbying effort will urge TV producers to stop depicting guns as exciting, and instead show the damage they do. The campaign also will promote story lines with nonviolent means of settling disputes.

Paul D. Imre, a retired Baltimore County public health official and decorated World War II veteran, died of a heart attack Saturday at his Columbia home. He was 83. Born in New York City, he enlisted in the Army immediately after his graduation from the Bronx High School of Science. He became an infantry paratrooper in World War II. He parachuted into Carentan, France, two days after the Allied invasion began and fought his way through the country until he reached Belgium. During heavy fighting in the Battle of Bulge in January 1945, he was wounded in the back by shrapnel near Mande St. Etienne.

Under glowing neon signs, amid strippers, barkers and a nervous parade of humanity, something unprecedented is happening on The Block in Baltimore. It's called public health. Maria Slechter, 22, totes a bag of clean hypodermic needles she provides to dancers and patrons, who turn in used ones. "They're shooting heroin and cocaine, I guarantee they are," says Slechter, wearing a black off-the-shoulder dress that helps her blend into the crowd. She is part of a group of outreach workers who since early May have descended on the region's densest concentration of nude dance clubs.

Loretta Paul Permutt, a retired Johns Hopkins School of Public Health administrator, died of pancreatic cancer Sunday at her Mount Washington home. She was 89. Born Loretta Paul in Pittsburgh, she served in Army intelligence in the Pacific during World War II. She left the service as a staff sergeant. She then attended Bryn Mawr College and the University of Chicago. She moved to Baltimore in the 1950s and, after raising her family, she became a Johns Hopkins School of Public Health clerk.

Dr. Thomas Burke, professor in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, was awarded the inaugural 2007 Faculty Award for Excellence in Academic Public Health Practice from the Association of Schools of Public Health and Pfizer Inc.'s Public Health and Government Group. The $10,000 award recognizes graduate public health faculty for their teaching and practice excellence. Dr. Robert A. Barish has been selected as the University of Maryland, Baltimore's Public Servant of the Year.

Our nation faces daunting health challenges that call for new public health strategies. A 2003 report from the Institute of Medicine, "Who Will Keep the Public Healthy?" concludes, "We are now facing problems that no one has seen before." It predicts that all cities and states in the 21st century will face changing disease patterns linked to climate change. The toll of poor lifestyle choices will mount. Alarming statistics on obesity, especially childhood obesity, Type 2 diabetes and mental health problems, along with the aging of the baby boomers, point to an even greater load for our health care delivery systems.

Dr. George Wills Comstock, an internationally known tuberculosis researcher and professor of epidemiology who established and headed the former Johns Hopkins Training Center for Public Health Research and Prevention in Hagerstown for 40 years, died Sunday of prostate cancer at his Smithsburg home. He was 92. Throughout his life, Dr. Comstock sought to inspire his students and colleagues with words that Horace Mann, educator and abolitionist, spoke in his 1859 commencement address at Antioch College: "I beseech you to treasure up in your hearts these my parting words: Be ashamed to die before you have won some victory for humanity."

The University of Maryland, Baltimore has suspended plans to open a school of public health this fall, noting budget concerns, and will reconsider its options in six months, officials said last night. In an e-mail to faculty yesterday afternoon, UMB President David J. Ramsay said that anticipated budget cuts to Maryland's higher education funding forced him to temporarily shelve plans for the new school, which was to be spun off from the downtown graduate campus' medical school. In an interview last night, University System of Maryland Chancellor William E. Kirwan said that Ramsay told him yesterday morning that unsuccessful negotiations with a prospective new dean of public health were part of the reason for halting the school's launch.

Mayor Sheila Dixon is forming a task force to investigate why Swann Park in South Baltimore remained open for 30 years despite studies showing high levels of arsenic in the soil there. "The community deserves to know why the park is the focus of our attention in 2007 and not much sooner," Dixon said in announcing the panel yesterday. The city Health Department closed the park last month after tests showed arsenic in the soil at more than 100 times safe levels. The testing was done after Honeywell International Inc. released documents from 1976 showing high arsenic levels at that time.

The University of Maryland's law school moved up in U.S. News and World Report's latest graduate school rankings, while the Johns Hopkins University maintained leading positions in medicine, public health and biomedical engineering. "We moved up more places in the rankings than any other top-tier law school," said Karen Rothenberg, the dean of the University of Maryland law school. "It's extraordinary." The Baltimore-based program jumped six slots this year to 36th overall in the magazine's rankings and 15th among public institutions.

It's a simple notion. The workweek ends with TGIF on Fridays, but it should begin with AHBL - "All Health Breaks Loose" - on Mondays. Public health advocates want to brand Monday the day for healthy lifestyle changes across America. The campaign was recently launched by Columbia University's School of Public Health. And because Jan. 1 fell on a Monday this year, what better day to start thinking healthy? Just as Friday's water cooler talk is "Whatcha doin' this weekend?," Monday's should be "Whatcha doin' for your health?"