Public Health Matters has been recognized by Juggle as one of the top government blogs on the web. Below you'll find an interview with one of the blog's contributors, Dr. Ali Khan.
- What was your impetus for launching a blog connecting citizens to the public health work of preventing and controlling infectious diseases?
I have a committed belief in transparency and knowledge sharing and I came to the conclusion that a blog was possibly an excellent way for CDC to further those aims. I am a strong believer in the use of blogs for people to reach others in disseminating any kind of information. I was very lucky to have on staff a web developer who was also a strong proponent of blogs, who also possessed the skills and knowledge to help make this happen under less than ideal circumstances.
The blog also gave a voice to our many scientists and managers to immediately tell their own stories without the formality and delays of our established mechanisms such as published reports and web updates. It was also a great way to engage the general public in what we did and give them a of the amazing CDC people behind the various headlines and reports.
At the time, winter of 2008, CDC did not have an infrastructure for blogs and our web developer and I agreed that the site should have a professional look and not one that is more traditionally associated with the government. To this end, our developer created a static website that mimicked the look of most private-sector blogs, (the most popular platform being WordPress). We did the blog with this static site for several months until the electronic media governing council of CDC acted on a decision to have CDC licensed with WordPress.
Included in this process was also the set up of an ongoing way to measure a couple of metrics. We have a weekly dashboard that tells us how many views of the site and it also gives us a general sense of how long people stay on the site.
- Can you give us some background on the Center for Disease Control's PHM blog?
In the beginning of the process we brainstormed a variety of blogs, which we called “stories” at the time, that could be written, which all happen to have started with the letter "P" including --
- Partner/partnership spotlights -- how working together we can achieve great things; or featuring unique/extraordinary contributions in a way that honors partners.
- Perspective pieces -- where we get a bit reflective or philosophical about some aspect of public health work.
- Place stories -- describing 'in the field' stories of domestic or overseas adventures
- Passion stories -- from people in our center who talk about "why they love their job and their work."
- Proficiencies and professions stories -- about the types of disciplines and professions that are needed to achieve public health impact.
- Problem solving stories -- about how mysteries were solved or methodological challenges overcome through innovation or about unsolved mysteries that still need solving.
Invited or self selecting guest’s topics tend to fall into one of these categories.
After while, we got people coming to us to tell their stories.
- What categories or topics does your blog typically cover, and why have you focused on these in particular?
Most of it is covered above, Most of our stories are about the adventures of public health scientists on the trail of various infectious diseases. A sort of CSI:CDC.
- How do you work to promote the Public Health Matters blog, both on- and off-line?
Certainly, when I give any kind of talk or presentation inside or outside of CDC, I mention the blog and include the URL in my materials and my business card. All other presenters in the center are encouraged to do the same. Additionally, we have asked employees to add the blog to their signature line with the tag line: Listening to our communities and sharing stories of our passion at www.cdc.gov/nczved/blog/. In the communication science office in the National Center for Emerging Zoonotic and Infectious diseases, we have a staff member who sits on the web council. It is my understanding that one of the functions of the council is to come up with unified CDC plans for promotion and dissemination of social media, including blogs.
CDC does have a very robust simple syndication (RSS) system and we’ve received a lot of exposure from that. And finally, of course, there is nothing like good old-fashioned word of mouth—even when discussing modern technological social media.
- How do your discussions and posts explain and focus on the human-animal-environment interface?
We naturally focus on the one health concept of human-animal-environment intersection. That is an underlying component of NCEZID’s approach to emerging and infectious diseases so most, if not all, of our blogs will in some way be related to this topic. About 75% of emerging infectious diseases arise from animal reservoirs. The One Health approach to us is about better human health, better animal health, and environmental stewardship.
- Public Health Matters allows comments from readers -- how hard was it to institute this, and how has it impacted the blog more generally?
In the beginning, with the static web site, handling comments was very time consuming. But because the blog was new and people were not aware of it yet we didn’t get many comments. Now that we’ve moved to a content management system, it is much easier to manage. There is still an approval process for what’s being posted, but that’s business as usual.
- How has citizen feedback influenced the development of Public Health Matters?
Receiving comments and being able to interact with the readers has helped us fine-tune the way we write the blogs. We try to make it engaging so that the readers want to talk to us about the topic, not just read our dissertation on the subject matter. We are, however, a science agency so first and foremost will be the need to retain good science in our blogs but with an eye toward helping the public understand that science in a more accessible way.
- Do you foresee any trends or technology emerging over the next 5 years that will enhance the manner in which the U.S. government personalizes its communication with citizens?
Over the past five years, social media, in general, has evolved into playing a big part in how the U.S. government communicates with its citizens. With efforts to become more transparent and technology allowing us to do so, it’s really hard to say what trends will enhance this. The mere fact that we’re embracing transparency opens the doors to communicating in more real-time with the people who need the information. With social media technologies advancing almost daily, we probably cannot begin to conceive of what will be available to us in 5 years.
- What else would you like to tell us about Public Health Matters?
Most importantly, that public health matters.