Northwestern Public Health Review

Osefame Ewaleifoh

Celeste Mallama

We are delighted to welcome you to the second edition of the Northwestern Public Health Review (NPHR). We have come a long way since our first issue, and it has been an exciting journey. Among other things, we have started a highly active public health blog (http://nphr.wordpress.com/), hosted the first ‘Public Health Matters’ reception, and started a growing public health bookshelf that highlights new and innovative public health works (http://www.publichealth.northwestern.edu/nphr/bookshelf.html). Perhaps most significantly, we have grown from two student editors to a diverse and dynamic editorial board consisting of 18 students and faculty members, drawn from various programs across the university. Working together, we pledge to continuously bring you the most insightful and engaging public health stories and perspectives.

We are thrilled that the Northwestern community has taken a strong interest in the publication, as manifested through recent contributions and partnerships between various programs across the University and the NPHR. We are deeply indebted to the Northwestern International Program Development, the Driskill Graduate Program, and the Program in Public Health, for providing the funds necessary for the printing of this edition. Specifically, we would like to thank Janka Pieper, Dr. Steven Anderson, and Maureen Moran for their constant and consistent support of the journal. This publication would not be possible without the overwhelming support we have received from the Northwestern community.

One of our major goals in founding the NPHR was to provide a common platform for the diverse array of fields that are involved in public health, and to share ideas and resources among these fields. In this edition of the NPHR, we are very pleased to expand our list of contributing authors and subject matter to include not only biologists and physicians but also engineers, economists, and neuroscientists. 

In this current issue, we focus on the untold stories in public health, highlighting reflections, histories, and research on issues that are not publicized as widely as others in the field of public health. Specifically, we explore the role of jails as mental health institutions, the creation of the atomic bomb commission, the neuroscience of sleep and its impact on health, as well as a reflection on the public health problem of texting and driving. We hope you enjoy reading each of these unique pieces as much as we did.

Finally, we would like to personally thank each of the contributors in this issue for their patience and intellectual investment in the NPHR. We also want to thank every member of the NPHR board for their labor of love that has made this edition the richly rewarding collection that it has become. 

Sincerely,

Celeste Mallama and Osefame Ewaleifoh

Editors-in-Chief

On behalf of the NPHR board