Livin' Well, San Diego!
Thursday, November 10, 2011 at 1:25PM This week, our Health and Human Services Agency gave the public a tremendous update on “Live Well, San Diego!” the ambitious, region-wide, 10-year health and well-being campaign we kicked off a year ago.
I know many of you didn’t get the chance to watch the Board hearing, or see the terrific video produced by our communications staff, but I hope you can take the time to review them when you can.
The “Live Well, San Diego!” plan really is ambitious and important. Our aim is to encourage healthier choices and to increase the safety of our communities.
Our County has accomplished a lot in the first year of this ten-year plan and it is always worth acknowledging and celebrating our milestones and successes.
Here’s just a few of the accomplishments outlined yesterday:
- We’ve worked with 211 San Diego, the region’s information line, to allow people to apply for CalFresh food stamps and Medi-Cal over the phone 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
- Through grant money, we launched an $8.4 million prevention and education campaign to reduce the stigma and discrimination of mental illness.
- We expanded the numbers of County seniors and children on CalFresh food stamps.
- We’ve expanded free fitness classes and health programs available in our 33 County libraries.
- We’ve worked with the San Diego Association of Governments to promote pedestrian and bicycle-friendly communities.
- We’ve worked with six school districts to promote and increase physical activity for kids.
“Live Well,” started as a health initiative — “Building Better Health,” which aims to fight the three behaviors, poor nutrition, inactivity and tobacco use, that contribute to four chronic diseases which kill more than 50% of Americans: heart disease/stroke, cancer, type 2 diabetes, and respiratory illnesses. This is called the 3-4-50 principle.
Frankly, we don’t just want to help people eat better, realize they need to get up and walk more and quit smoking.
We also want to improve our systems - how we deliver health services. We want to empower residents to take responsibility for their own health and encourage smart choices. We will look for opportunities to support and create policies that create healthy environments.
And many of us — County employees — want to lead by example, to serve as role models for the region and show how we can all live better, longer, healthier lives by pursuing wellness and good health.
So, Live Well, San Diego!
Reader Comments (2)
As a new employee with the County (as of June 6, 2011), I am very impressed with the progress made in just one short year by the County of San Diego - and its affiliated care providers - in mobilizing this new Health strategy. The County's Annual Report on this initiative shows many innovative approaches to delivering numerous health awareness messages and programs to improve well-being in San Diego County. We are fortunate to be part of such a progressive County!
I’m proud of the fact that my employer, the County of San Diego, has not only been able to meet the needs of the public, but has recently initiated programs to promote good health in our communities and among its employees. I was amazed and happy that our administration solicited suggestions from our some15,000 employees as to what could be done to promote good health in our community. We’ve been urged to set good examples. I, myself bicycle commuted 9 miles round-trip to work until 2 years ago when a problem came up. Now I need some good suggestions for a small but important dilemma. What happened 2 years ago is I discovered I was not permitted to us a hairdryer at work to “touch up” my hairdo which gets crushed in my safety helmet while bicycling to work. I’m looking for some good suggestions from any employee or administrator to solve this small but important-to-me problem. I want to get back to setting a good example and keeping myself healthy by bicycle commuting again ! Margaret Kunsman