Home >> About Us >> Success Stories

Success Stories

Under the leadership of Mayor Michael Bloomberg, New York City has made improving citizen health a top priority. Over the last eight years, the rise in life expectancy of New Yorkers has substantially outpaced that of Americans as a whole. Since 2002, adult smoking has decreased by 27%, representing 350,000 fewer adult smokers, and the rate of smoking in public high school students has dropped by 52%. In 2008, the risk of dying from premature heart disease was 17% lower compared to 2002.

The NYC Health Department has accomplished this by developing and implementing bold ideas that transform public health. The Department is renowned for its data-driven focus and for effectively utilizing grant funding to expand the department's capacity to test, pilot and bring to scale non-traditional health policies and programs. Replication of NYC policies and programs is widespread. Below are examples of these successes:

  • When New York City passed its Smoke Free Air Act in 2002, no other cities and only one state had enacted a comprehensive smoke-free air law. Today, nearly 30 states and more than a dozen countries have adopted similar legislation, following New York City's lead.
  • When NYC restricted the use of trans fat in food service establishments, no other jurisdictions had taken this measure. Two years after New York City's action, 12 local governments and 1 state had adopted similar measures and more than 50 restaurant chains and dozens of hotel groups, food manufacturers, grocery retailers and other major companies announced or reiterated their intention to discontinue the use of artificial trans fat-containing products on a national level--and most have already done so.
  • NYC's calorie labeling regulation of 2006 was another first - in the world. Since then, calorie labeling has been introduced in over 50 states and counties, and in 2009, it was made federal law with the passage of the Affordable Care Act.
  • In 2008, NYC created the National Salt Reduction Initiative to convene leaders in the food industry to discuss voluntary reductions in the sodium content of restaurant and packaged foods. As a result, more than 60 cities, states, and national health organizations and 20 major food companies have signed on to targets to reduce the sodium levels in foods. If sodium levels are reduced as planned it could save tens of thousands of lives annually from lower levels of hypertension, stroke, and heart disease.

Indeed, the NYC Health Department is a national leader in public health and much of this success is because of the Health Department's ability to build public-private partnerships through its non-profit partner, the Fund for Public Health in New York (FPHNY). We know this model can work, because it already has. Private funding has helped launch some of New York City's most important public health initiatives during the last eight years. FPHNY has helped channel more than $30 million of private funds into 58 NYC initiatives over the past seven years. Private funds have accomplished the following:

  • Provided seed funding for the National Salt Reduction Initiative to build databases to measure sodium levels in foods.
  • Created a world class epidemiology mentorship program in collaboration with the leading schools of public health in the country to create the next generation of public health professional leaders.
  • Placed NYC ahead of the country in building prevention-oriented electronic health records for doctors-and offering a national model in doing so, which is a major step toward improving the quality of health care for New Yorkers. Private funding has been central to its development and evaluation.
  • Established 39 health clinics in schools to support teen pregnancy prevention goals.
  • Eliminated disparities in colon cancer screening amongst socio-economic groups and drove up life-saving colon cancer screenings rates.

The NYC Health Department's work is not finished. The city still faces significant public health problems, ranging from obesity and diabetes to mental illness. We are poised to address these problems, but government alone cannot solve them. The economic downturn has sharply cut the funds available to support innovative public health initiatives in New York City. The need is great, but the potential for improving health further is even greater. If the private sector will support continued innovation in public health, the second decade of this century can be as ground-breaking as the first. Learn more about how you can support the innovative work of the NYC Health Department.