Holly A. Taylor, PhD, MPH, is an Associate Professor, Department of Health Policy and Management; Lainie Rutkow, PhD, JD, is a Professor, Department of Health Policy and Management; and Daniel J. Barnett, MD, MPH, is an Associate Professor, Department of Environmental Health and Engineering; all in the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, Maryland.
Health Secur. 2018 Sep/Oct;16(5):311-319. doi: 10.1089/hs.2018.0046.
As ecologic, social, and economic conditions continue to facilitate the emergence and transmission of infectious diseases, local health department workers' willingness to respond will remain vital to the United States' ability to recognize and respond to new and emerging disease threats. As demonstrated by heavy occupational morbidity and mortality associated with the 2014 Ebola outbreak, infectious disease response can pose serious risks to the health workforce and presents many ethical and logistical challenges. To explore willingness to respond to an infectious disease outbreak among local health departments-the hub of the public health emergency preparedness system-we conducted focus groups with 46 local health department staff attending 2 national conferences. We examined perspectives from our participants on how local health department employees learn about and articulate their professional commitment to the department, the ways in which local health department leaders support local health department employees in responding to an outbreak, and how local health department staff articulate their responsibilities to their families. We conclude with a proposal for how a web of ethical commitments likely influences willingness to respond. These commitments and their relationship to willingness to respond should be explored further.
随着生态、社会和经济条件继续促进传染病的出现和传播，地方卫生部门工作人员的应对意愿对于美国识别和应对新出现的疾病威胁的能力仍然至关重要。正如 2014 年埃博拉疫情爆发所带来的高职业发病率和死亡率所表明的那样，传染病应对可能对卫生工作者的健康构成严重威胁，并带来许多道德和后勤方面的挑战。为了探索地方卫生部门（公共卫生应急准备系统的核心）对传染病爆发的应对意愿，我们对参加 2 次全国会议的 46 名地方卫生部门工作人员进行了焦点小组讨论。我们研究了参与者的观点，了解他们如何了解并表达自己对部门的职业承诺，地方卫生部门领导如何支持地方卫生部门工作人员应对疫情，以及地方卫生部门工作人员如何向家人表达自己的责任。最后，我们提出了一个关于道德承诺网络如何影响应对意愿的建议。应该进一步探讨这些承诺及其与应对意愿的关系。
