Date: Tue, 28 Feb 2006 23:34:09 -0500
From: "Matt Anderson" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Inauguration of a new journal: Social Medicine
The Department of Family and Social Medicine at Montefiore Medical
Center and Albert Einstein College of Medicine is very pleased to
announce the inauguration of an open-access journal entitled Social
Medicine. Our first issue reprints a classic paper in social
medicine: Rudolf Virchow's report on the 1848 typhus epidemic in
Silesia:
"The logical answer to the question as to how conditions similar to
those that have unfolded before our eyes in Upper Silesia can be
prevented in the future is, therefore, very easy and simple:
education, with its daughters, liberty and prosperity. Less easy and
simple, however, is the practical answer, the solution of this great
social problem. For let us not conceal this from ourselves, we
are now
directly facing part of the great task which our century has
initiated
in human history and which carries within itself the development of
the future. […]. Medicine has imperceptibly led us into the social
field and placed us in a position of confronting directly the great
problems of our time. Let it be well understood, it is no longer a
question of treating one typhus patient or another by drugs or
by the
regulation of food, housing and clothing."
Virchow's report has not been available on the web previously and is
accompanied by an introductory essay by Dr. Howard Waitzkin of the
University of New Mexico.
Social Medicine is an international, open-access, peer-reviewed
academic forum for the development and promotion of social medicine.
The journal is written with the inventive, engaged and critical
vision
that animated the founders of Social Medicine. To make this vision a
reality the journal will:
1. Act as a forum for research and teaching concerning the ways in
which social factors not only influence health and disease but
are in
turn altered by health and disease.
2. Support the WHO Alma Ata goals of Health for All and the holistic
vision of health contained in the WHO charter.
3. Produce materials that are scientifically sound, intellectually
honest, free of commercial bias and clearly written and presented.
4. Organize the journal in a way that reflects and supports the
diverse international community working in the field of social
medicine. To realize the goals of "Health for All" we must have a
journal that includes the voices of all.
Our inaugural issue is in English, but a Spanish-language
translation
will appear soon. By the end of the year we anticipate publishing
quarterly with simultaneous English and Spanish editions.
www.socialmedicine.info
Matt Anderson, MD
Department of Family and Social Medicine, MMC/AECOM
--
Matthew Anderson, MD, MSc
Montefiore Family Health Center
360 E. 193rd St.
Bronx, NY, 10458
phone: 718 933-2400
fax: 718 367-8168
www.socialmedicine.org
