Foundations of Policy

"Twenty-first century leaders in medicine and government are confronted by questions of enormous magnitude: What are the determinants of disease and its distribution?  How should health outcomes be measured? How are we to optimize health care delivery and financing, and how are we to ensure access to the fruits of medical science to the poor of this country and the developing world? However, such twenty-first century dilemmas are not new."

The Center of the History of Medicine of the Countway Library has been growing under the leadership of Scott Podolsky and Kathryn Baker Hammond and most recently they were awarded a grant from the Andrew Mellon Foundation that will enable, for the first time, research in the manuscript collections of four influential leaders in public health: Leona Baumgartner, Alan Macy Butler, Howard Hiatt, and David Rutstein. This adds to the growing list of new initiatives by the Center, An important step towards understanding the current and future challenges in public health.