The Public Health Institute and Blue Shield of California Foundation Announce Inaugural Pittman Prize Winners

November 13, 2024, Oakland, CA: A cohort of creative visionary leaders, and their innovative projects, have been announced as the inaugural recipients of the Public Health Institute’s Pittman Prize awards, totaling $30,000. The Pittman Prize was created by the Public Health Institute (PHI) in 2023 to honor previous PHI president Dr. Mary A. Pittman for her contributions to the field. Nominations are made from within PHI’s portfolio of more than sixty public health programs to recognize and support innovative and effective approaches to addressing health challenges, both domestic and global, and to help to raise awareness of the importance of investing in public health research and initiatives.

The Pittman Prize was supported by generous donations, including support from Blue Shield of California, and Blue Shield of California Foundation, which supports lasting and equitable solutions to make California the healthiest state.

“In doing so, they are honoring the vision of Dr. Mary Pittman who believes in preventing health inequities from happening in the first place. The critical issues represented—such as reproductive health, access to care, disparities faced by vulnerable populations, birth outcomes for Black mothers and migrant workers, and recovery from substance use—impact entire families and communities. Thanks to PHI for recognizing and rewarding these important initiatives,” said Debbie Chang, President and CEO of Blue Shield of California Foundation.

2024 Pittman Prize Awardees

Pittman Prize for PHI PI/PD Excellence & Impact, (two awards, $5000 each), recognizing an individual for their service, leadership, innovation, and effective approaches to addressing public health challenges, domestically or globally.

Dr. Bethany Young Holt, PHI’s CAMI Health, for her tremendous work and leadership over the past 30 years in the field of reproductive health for women and girls around the world. Dr. Young Holt played a significant role in the formation of the multipurpose prevention technology (MPT) field through her creation of the CAMI Health program, which she brought to PHI in 2004. Her steadfast rise as a recognized expert in the field has contributed to more than 20 MPT products in development designed to provide protection from unplanned pregnancies, and HIV and other sexually transmitted infections (STIs) at the same time. Dr. Young Holt’s passion and dedication to women’s health and advancing the field of MPTs shines a bright and positive light on PHI as well as her own work.

Dr. Ryan Whitacre, PHI’s Prevention Policy Group, for his work including current projects that diagnose commercial determinants of health that reinforce disparities (in cancer, infectious disease, substance use), mitigate financial toxicity for patients in need for life-saving therapies, and improve rights, protections and services for queer refugees. Not only is Dr. Whitacre a respected research scientist at PHI who brings a deep sensitivity for understanding the lived experiences of individuals that are often overlooked in our drive for data, but his colleagues and peers recognize him for his humor, compassion, and dedication to improving the lives and health outcomes of queer and other marginalized communities.

Pittman Prize for an Emerging PHI Program, ($10,000) recognizing nascent or new programs at PHI in the early stages of development who also offer an unmatched capacity for exponential growth due to an unmet need in the field and funder demand.

The California Coalition for Black Birth Justice, led by Dana Sherrod, a new PHI program structured as a statewide organization, which is committed to strengthening and unifying the Black birth justice movement in California and beyond. In order to truly disrupt and ultimately reverse the inequities in Black maternal and infant health, they call for sustained investments in Black-led organizations, new ways of working together, and equity-centered actions from policymakers, philanthropists, and healthcare systems. Their work focuses on being a statewide connector and convener, supporting the care and capacity of the Black birth justice workforce, and scaling systems change improvement efforts with health care organizations.

Pittman Prize: Seed Funding (two awards of $2,500 each), for work approaching challenges in health from an equity lens and focus on supporting innovative solutions to public health challenges, with the potential to transform healthcare delivery and improve health outcomes for people around the world. This funding may be the catalyst for starting work or bringing like-minded collaborators together to work on an idea.

Jamie Frederick, PHI’s Center for Wellness and Nutrition (CWN), Promoting Healthy Pregnancies among Farmworkers in California, for a partnership with the Mixteco Indigena Community Organizing Project (MICOP) to conduct an implementation research project that would expand community-clinical linkages in support of services to pregnant farmworkers in Ventura, Santa Barbara and Santa Maria counties. Using a design thinking approach, PHI CWN will work with MICOP to engage pregnant Indigenous farmworkers in co-creating solutions to address barriers to care. The solutions will be decided upon collaboratively and piloted with local community health experts to determine if the solutions are effective and can be scaled for greater impact.  Seed funding would go towards seeking and identifying additional funding opportunities to support the implementation research partnership.

Meenakshi Subbaraman and Elizabeth Mahoney, PHI’s Behavioral Health and Recovery Studies, Assessing the Role of Cannabis in Sober Living Houses. As more states legalize cannabis, the question of how sober living home (SLH) operators should address cannabis use in their houses is becoming more pressing.  The team will write a NIDA R01 grant proposal to examine the role of cannabis in SLHs. Specifically, their aims are to: examine how cannabis use is related to alcohol or other drug use, mental health, and recovery capital outcomes among SLH residents using longitudinal data; assess why individuals who live in SLHs use cannabis and how this aligns with their recovery and living in an abstinence-based environment; and identify the range of current cannabis use policies and practices in SLHs. To meet these aims, they will randomly sample SLHs in Los Angeles using similar methods as in prior studies undertaken by the team.

Pittman Prize: Innovative Solutions ($5,000), for innovative approaches, this year focusing on community-engaged health interventions, a one health approach, and/or new ways to advance equity with impact.

Colleen Flynn and Dr. Ruth Thomas-Squance, PHI’s Build Healthy Places Network (BHPN), Building a Sustainable Future: Healthcare, Public Health, and Community Development Can Unite for Climate Justice. BHPN proposes to foster multisector partnerships between community development, healthcare, and public health organizations to address climate justice and the disproportionate impact of climate change on low-income communities. Recognizing the critical need for collaboration across sectors, we will conduct interviews with leaders in community development, healthcare, and public health to understand the roles of each sector in addressing climate change, as well as the challenges and opportunities for partnership. This research will inform a virtual workshop composed of sector leaders and practitioners. The discussion will focus on strategies for building and strengthening these partnerships and catalyzing collective action to advance climate justice.

2024 Joe Hafey Award

PHI also awarded the 2024 Joe Hafey Leadership award in the amount of $7,000, in recognition of PHI founder and inaugural President Joe Hafey.

Brooke Briggance, PHI’s Cypress Resilience Project, When Community Serves Community: Addressing Vicarious Trauma in the Public Health Workforce. Cypress will address all three areas identified as priorities for the Joe Hafey Leadership award—workforce resilience and retention, workforce development and training, and leadership development. Since 2020, the Cypress team has been working with public health departments and health systems across the country. Leveraging a technical infrastructure they developed working with counties, health systems, public health career pathways, and public health CBO’s, Cypress will market fee-for-service trauma informed interventions at various levels; building upon content they already have in place. This strategy will serve to diversify the Cypress funding streams while building a strong network for new content development that evolves to meet needs on-the-ground.

Congratulations to all the recipients.

About Blue Shield of California Foundation

Blue Shield of California Foundation supports lasting and equitable solutions to make California the healthiest state and end domestic violence. When we work together to remove the barriers to health and well-being, especially for Californians most affected, we can create a more just and equitable future. For more information, visit: Blue Shield of California Foundation.

About the Public Health Institute

The Public Health Institute, an independent nonprofit organization, advances wellbeing and health equity with communities around the world. PHI develops research, leadership and partnerships to build strong public health policy, programs, systems and practices.