Federal Health Agencies
Health activities of the federal government are
carried on chiefly by or under the supervision of the
Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. This
department coordinates and directs all federal health
and welfare activities. Since 1953 the administrator has
been a member of the President’s Cabinet, with the title
of Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare.
The United States Public Health Service is an agency
within the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare
and is under the direction of a surgeon general, who
holds the highest public health position on the country.
The organizational structure of the Service has changed
over the years, but its purposes remain broad enough to
meet changing health needs of the nation. Its
responsibilities are to conduct and support research in
health and the allied sciences, to provide, on request,
consultative serves in health matters to health
agencies, to furnish medical and hospital care for
designated beneficiaries, and to act as the responsible
federal agency in dealing with other nations of the
world in international health matters.
The National Institutes, of Health, a division of
the Public Health Service, is the principal federal
agency engaged in the conduct and support of medical and
health related research. It is one of the largest
research centers in the world, conducting within its own
facilities studies of every major problem affecting
community and national health. Among its many
activities, it supports health or health related
scientific research at universities, medical school, and
other institutions, aids applicants eligible to pursue a
research career, and provides funds to assist in
building and equipping of research facilities in the
health science field. In addition to quest of disease
and the improvement of human health, the National
Institutes of Health is responsible for administration
of controls designed to insure the purity, safety, and
potency of all sera and vaccines used for the prevention
and treatment of disease.
The Children’s Bureau, also and agency of the
Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, was
established in 1912 as a result of the findings and
recommendations of the first White House Conference on
Children held in 1909. The Children’s Bureau is
concerned with all aspects of the growth and development
of children, the problems of illness, maternal and child
health and all social and environmental factors
affection their welfare. It collects, analyzes, and
interprets statistical data concerning children and
youth and develops material and standards to be used by
persons or agencies responsible for the health care or
protection of mother and children. The Bureau also gives
technical assistance to improve the conditions of
childhood and administers the finical aid that the
federal government appropriates each year for the health
and welfare of children. Its services have expanded
through the years, always with the aim of improving the
health and welfare of children.
The publication of health education materials by the
Children’s Bureau has reached into million of homes, and
one pamphlet, Infant Care, first printed in 1914, rates
as a best-seller. Over the years more then 43 million
copies have distributed. It available in the United
State in both English and Spanish editions and has been
translated into 11 languages for use abroad.
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