Improving urban health.

New York's public health priorities initiative, Communities Working Together for a Healthier New York, creates a framework for communities, including urban areas, to identify and address their most pressing public health problems. It is both a call to action and a guide for the state's communities. The priorities identified in this initiative were the product of extensive public input across the state. Interestingly, the priorities identified by rural counties were consistent with those identified in the New York City workshop. To a great extent, urban and rural dwellers have the same health problems, such as teenage pregnancy, substance abuse, and tobacco use, although to different degrees. Accordingly, we need to recognize that we are a global society, in which the line separating urban and rural has thinned, if not disappeared. Improving health status in our communities, whether urban or rural, requires broad-based collaboration. It requires setting special interests aside and focusing on the good of the whole community. It requires sharing resources and expertise, as was done in the asthma study. By developing a shared vision of what our health priorities are, by forming partnerships in our communities to address them, and by employing the use of effective and innovative interventions, we will improve health status in our communities.