Public health policy conversations should include nurses

Medical Xpress August 3, 2022
Mallory Locklear, Yale University

The COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the critical role nurses play in health care—millions of nurses worldwide have been essential administers of care on the front lines of the global health crisis. Yet in debate around public health policy, advocates say, nurses have historically been left out of the conversation, lacking representation in media coverage, health care leadership, government, and academic publications.

In a recent paper published in the American Journal of Public Health, Jennifer Morone, a nurse and research fellow with the National Clinician Scholars Program at Yale School of Medicine, and colleagues explore this historical, and frustrating, phenomenon and what can be done about it.