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Letters To The Editor
February 2019

Posted following the January 2019 issue.

The Epidemiology Monitor is celebrating its 40th, while the Epidemiology Department at the Hopkins School of Public Health celebrated its 100th birthday by thinking about the state of epidemiology--- past and future.

This thought-provoking interview reported with Prof. Bryan Lau gives me pause to wonder how it is that the topic of epidemiology's role to inform policy does not appear to have been considered in the interview when considering the state of epidemiology--- past and future. As the science to inform public health policy (as per the most commonly used definitions), I wonder how it was missed? This question relates to yet another anniversary among epidemiologists:
 
2019 is the 12th anniversary of what was founded as the Joint Policy Committee of the Societies of Epidemiology (JPC-SE) in Seattle in 2006; it assumed operations in 2007. The organization grew substantially from 2012, and re-branded itself in 2018 as the International Network for Epidemiology in Policy (INEP)
www.epidemiologyinpolicy.org.

INEP has focused on the role of epidemiology at the interface of research and policy. It has enjoyed much support from some of our societies of epidemiology, internationally, but not from others. Some prefer to avoid the policy realm, yet we are hearing more and more about "translational" and "consequential" epidemiology.

Some reasons for not participating in

INEP are that there is a preference to not engage with ethics in the research and practice dimensions of our discipline; others have historically expressed the preference to focus exclusively on epidemiological methods; others simply do not, being volunteer associations and societies, have the capacity to join with INEP, a consortium/umbrella organization. And, others have meanwhile set up - within their own sub-specialty organizations of epidemiology - their own policy committees.  

This fragmentation perhaps warrants attention by epidemiologists worldwide if our social relevance and capacity to influence policy are to be maintained and ideally strengthened.  

Colin L Soskolne, PhD


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