Contact: Maridith Geuder
On Thursday, July 24, Dr. William H. Dietz of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control will provide a detailed measure of Mississippi's overweight population.
Dietz's presentation at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson is titled "Obesity in Mississippi: Policy, Environmental and Program Approaches." He currently directs the CDC's Division of Nutrition and Physical Activity in the Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion.
The noon program at the Norman C. Nelson Student Union is the first in the Bower Seminar Series recently established by the new Mississippi Health Policy Research Center and UMC. Financial support for the series is provided by the Jackson-based Bower Foundation, whose mission is the improvement of the health of all Mississippians.
Officially launched this spring, the Mississippi Health Policy Research Center is a major unit of the Social Science Research Center at Mississippi State University. Celebrating its 53rd year, the SSRC is a nationally recognized organization engaged in the analysis and study of important social and economic issues facing the state, region and nation.
While Dr. Dietz's comments will be geared primarily to medical, government agency and legislative audiences, members of the news media are encouraged to attend. For the convenience of reporters, he will be available at 11:30 a.m. for a brief question-and-answer session preceding the program.
Prior to his CDC appointment, Dietz was a professor of pediatrics at Tufts University School of Medicine and director of clinical nutrition at the Floating Hospital of New England Medical Center Hospitals. He also has served as a director of the Boston Obesity/Nutrition Research Center funded by the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases.
For more information on the first Bower Seminar, contact Ellen S. Jones of the MHPRC at (601) 898-9339; or Barbara Austin or Bruce Coleman of UMC at 984-1100.