Robert D. Gidel, Jr. — Managing Owner
David A. Hubert — Online Producer
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HEALTHY PEOPLE 2020
     The Healthy People initiative is a collaborative health promotion and disease prevention effort with a vision towards a healthier nation. Released by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services each decade, it is a comprehensive set of goals and objectives aimed at improving health and eliminating health disparities over the course of a decade.
     With established baselines, measurable objectives and ten-year targets, progress is monitored throughout the decade, and strategies are identified to facilitate progress. Healthy People is used as a tool for strategic management by the federal government, states, communities, and many other public- and private-sector partners.
     The fourth generation of this initiative, Healthy People 2020, was launched in December 2010. Healthy People provides science-based, national goals and objectives with 10-year targets designed to guide national health promotion and disease prevention efforts to improve the health of all people in the United States.
    For three decades, Healthy People has established benchmarks and monitored progress over time in order to:
• Identify nationwide health improvement priorities.
• Increase public awareness and understanding of the determinants of health, disease, and disability and the opportunities for progress.
• Provide measurable objectives and goals that are applicable at the national, State, and local levels.
• Engage multiple sectors to take actions to strengthen policies and improve practices that are driven by the best available evidence and knowledge.
• Identify critical research, evaluation, and data collection needs.
Healthy People 2020 contains about 1,200 objectives in 42 Topic Areas designed to serve as this decade’s framework for improving the health of all people in the United States:
http://www.healthypeople.gov/2020/topicsobjectives2020/default.aspx
     Healthy People 2020 reflects a vision of a society in which all people live long, healthy lives. This decade, several new features will help make this vision a reality, most notably an interactive website that includes evidence-based interventions and resources to support achieving Healthy People goals and objectives:
http://healthypeople.gov/2020/default.aspx

USEFUL TERMS
Health Promotion is the art and science of helping people discover the synergies between their core passions and optimal health, enhancing their motivation to strive for optimal health, and supporting them in changing their lifestyle to move toward a state of optimal health.[1]
Optimal Health is a dynamic balance of physical, emotional, social, spiritual, and intellectual health. Lifestyle change can be facilitated through a combination of learning experiences that enhance awareness, increase motivation, and build skills and, most important, through the creation of opportunities that open access to environments that make positive health practices the easiest choice.[1]
Health Promotion is the process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve, their health. It moves beyond a focus on individual behaviour towards a wide range of social and environmental interventions.[2]
Health Promotion Strategies are not limited to a specific health problem, nor to a specific set of behaviours. World Health Organization (WHO) as a whole applies the principles of, and strategies for, health promotion to a variety of population groups, risk factors, diseases, and in various settings. Health promotion, and the associated efforts put into education, community development, policy, legislation and regulation, are equally valid for prevention of communicable diseases, injury and violence, and mental problems, as they are for prevention of noncommunicable diseases.[2]
Health Promotion goes beyond health care. It puts health on the agenda of policy makers in all sectors and at all levels, directing them to be aware of the health consequences of their decisions and to accept their responsibilities for health.[2]

[1] Michael O’Donnell PhD MBA MPH. Definition of Health Promotion 2.0: embracing passion, enhancing motivation, recognizing dynamic balance, and creating opportunities. Am J Health Promot. 2009 Sept-Oct;24(1):iv.
[2] Milestones in Health Promotion - Statements from Global Conferences. World Health Organization (WHO), Health promotion. WHO Press, World Health Organization, WHO/NMH/CHP/09.01.