Title
To honor our own Columbus Health Department and Franklin County for their national recognition and trailblazing leadership on receiving a "Immunization Coverage Award" from the Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
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WHEREAS, the success is in direct relation to Project L.O.V.E (Love Our kidsÂ…Vaccinate Early!). A true community partnership, Project L.O.V.E. is a collaboration among area hospitals, local health departments, businesses, physicians and community organizations and volunteers and is housed at Columbus Public Health; and
WHEREAS, Columbus Public Health and L.O.V.E. represents an unprecedented public/private partnership, with Franklin County receiving national recognition for its collaborative efforts and achievements and through increasing participation of the entire community; and
WHEREAS, Project L.O.V.E. was formed in 1993 in response to studies which revealed that less than half of the children in Franklin County were appropriately immunized by age 2; and
WHEREAS, the problem extended across all areas of our community, regardless of income and neighborhood; and
WHEREAS, achieving and maintaining a 90 percent rate of immunization among 2-year-olds is the goal of Project L.O.V.E. which means motivation those populations who face the greatest number of obstacles in obtaining preventive health care; and
WHEREAS, there are over 17,000 babies born in Franklin County each year and many of these are to first time parents that will need reminders and education about the importance of on-time vaccinations; and
WHEREAS, healthy people 2010, which is designed to achieve an increase to the quality and years of healthy life, identifies immunizations as 1 of 10 Leading Health Indicators (LHIs) as our nation's top priority as a major health concern; now, therefore
BE IT RESOLVED BY THE COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF COLUMBUS:
That this Council does hereby congratulate the staff members of the Columbus Health Department for all of their work in protecting the health of our community and in particular for their leadership in setting standards to help to eliminate health disparities for racial and ethnic minorities.