Keynote Address
Speakers: Jeffrey P. Koplan, M.D., M.P.H. (click here for biography)
Soap Summit 4

Transcript of Proceedings
October 8, 1999

SONNY FOX: I want to introduce a gentleman who, tomorrow morning, will be speaking at some length. But tonight, I've asked him to come up and make a couple of brief announcements that relate what's happening in the soap community and with the Centers For Disease Control. Dr. Jeffrey Koplan is one of a number of people that are in this room tonight who we have been gathered for tomorrow, who have an extraordinary set of CV's, I hope those of you who have the CV's in your book will take time to look at them. These are the most astonishing group of people, and trust me, we are not paying any of them. They have come from Texas, from Florida, from Kansas, from Atlanta, and other parts of California. They're here because they take you seriously, because they understand how important you are. These are extraordinarily busy people with extraordinary talents and extraordinary responsibilities, but they're here. You will hear them tomorrow across the spectrum. Tonight you will get at least a touch of Dr. Koplan who is the Director of the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta. Dr. Koplan was appointed to that, and assumed his duties on October 5th, 1998. As Director, he leads the premiere health agency of the Department of HHS, Health and Human Services, responsible for promoting health and the quality of life. He has been part of the Epidemic Intelligence Service, the service for all disease detectives, he has been part of the smallpox eradication program, the Caribbean Epidemiology Program. He has won the Public Service Distinguished Service award, the highest award given, as well as other PHS awards. He has worked in Finland, in China, in Hungary Remember the Bohpal chemical disaster in India? This is the man who led our team over there to investigate that disaster. He is a man who comes with great credentials, and we are delighted that he has given up his time to be with us. Dr. Koplan, may I ask you to step up here and deliver a few points tonight.

DR. JEFFREY KOPLAN: Thanks Sonny, for that kind of introduction. Could you go over that lack of pay part again? I have to admit I'm a little uneasy being in this hotel. My previous employer had a large conference here that was supposed to revitalize our product. We took over the whole hotel and the theater next door with a huge stage extravaganza that I think many of you in the entertainment business would have been proud to have been able to produce as well. In the subsequent fiscal year, our division of the company lost three hundred million dollars.

Nevertheless, it's with great pleasure that I had a chance to chat with you a little bit this evening. This opportunity is terrific for me, because one member of my family is not into health. Three, the other two members besides myself are in health-related fields or intend to go into them. One isn't, and has chosen a career in theater, and has been in New York for the last four years. For years now he has said to me, "You know, I get no benefit from what you do. You've got to talk to all these groups and you work with this disease and that disease, and none of it means anything to me or my friends." And so this event, and being with you all tonight, has had terrific significance. Unfortunately, he left New York two weeks ago and is in Seattle now, so no points for me on that one.

Many of you have heard of CDC. I'm not sure how familiar you are with the details of what we do. Very briefly, we have a major responsibility in the U.S. for public health activities, for disease prevention and health promotion on a wide range of issues. When I sit next to folks in the plane you get in that conversation, "What do you do, where do you work." I say I'm from CDC, they'll say, "Oh, you must work with Ebola virus." Well, I know people who work with Ebola virus, but we have a wider range of responsibilities.

Those of you who live in New York are familiar with a role we play with acute infectious diseases, with the recent encephalitis outbreak here, E Coli in upstate New York. But we also deal in chronic diseases. Heart disease, cancer, stroke, diabetes, and the risk factors for those. Tobacco. We produce the Surgeon General's report on tobacco, physical activity and nutrition. We have major activities in environmental health, environmental hazards, occupational health, maternal and child health issues, reproductive health, injury control, and violence prevention. We cover the spectrum of what constitutes public health at the end of the 20th Century, and as we go into the 21st. There's a wide range of issues for which we have interest and responsibility. Our primary role is protection of the public's health and education to improving the public's health through prevention. Little of what we do could be considered entertaining, except to us. And so we welcome the partnership with you all.

I think we fully recognize the value you provide us in extending a message. We've got a lot of messages to give. Not all of them palatable, not all of them the people want to hear, but we think that they are important for folks to get, and you go a great way towards getting some of those messages across in a context of entertainment to a large number of people. We thank you for that and value it greatly. We fully appreciate the fact that the types of television programming that you work in are ones that go on the air on a daily basis. You have the time to explore plot twist details and characters in much greater depth than some other programming.

And with it, there is greater luxury in providing other pieces of information during the course of it. It's clear that your viewers take the health information that you provide them, and the characters and stories you present quite seriously. A recent survey conducted by Porter Novelli confirms the role of television in general, and soap operas, in particular, play as sources of health information and as potential models of positive, healthy behaviors.

Twenty-six hundred adults were surveyed in this study. Eighty three percent of them cited television as a major source of health information. About a third of those studied watched soap operas at least a few times a month, and a fifth of the survey respondents watched soap operas regularly, at least two or three times a week. Nearly half of those regular viewers reported that they learned about diseases and how to prevent them from soap operas. In response to health information presented through the characters in your programs, twenty-five percent of the regular viewers had shared the health information with friends and family members. So there's a dissemination role. Thirteen percent had urged someone close to them to take a health-related action, based on what they learned from your programs. Going to visit a doctor. Having a screening test. Getting some counseling. Seven percent had visited a clinic or a doctor and six percent had done something to prevent the problem.

These are very effective numbers. I think most health education, health promotion programs would be very proud to have those as results of the programs they undertook. When we looked at women and African-Americans who were regular viewers, we found even more effects. Women in minorities were even more likely to share the health information from soap operas with friends and family members, urge someone else to take action, and visit a clinic or a doctor.

The fact that soap opera viewers are less likely to get health information through regular doctor visits or other more traditional forms of health care, makes the health information you present even more critical. The prospect of sneaking education and useful health messages into an entertainment-coated package is irresistible to us in public health. This is especially true because your most loyal audiences include some of the age groups, education and income levels and minority groups most at risk for diseases that can be prevented.

Because of your impact on the health beliefs and behaviors of your viewers and those around them, we're pleased to announce a new CDC award. And let me add, it is the first CDC award for a part of the entertainment industry. We're going call it the Sentinel For Health Award For Daytime Drama. This award will be our way of acknowledging the importance of the work you do, the positive influence you have on your viewer's behaviors and choices, and the untapped potential that we believe exists for doing more.

All 11 daytime dramas that originated here in the United States are eligible for the award. A panel of judges from public health, entertainment, advocacy and academic organizations will select the winner next June. We are looking for at least three episodes that air between now and May 31st of next year that one, create a unique, compelling storyline about a public health topic. Communicate specific information about how to prevent disease, injury or disability. Show the consequences of risky behavior or the benefits of healthy behavior. Examine the causes and impact of disease, injury or disability. Or, dispel common misconceptions and myths about disease, injury or disability. We recognize that many of you have already written and aired episodes that meet these criteria, as you've portrayed HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases, cancer, teen pregnancies, car crashes, domestic violence and other situations that we work hard to prevent. Sorry you can't get the award, because that's for work you already have done. We appreciate the impact that you have already had, but we really are looking forward to your creativity, engaging in the new material that you'll be working on this year. We are looking forward to contribute, in any way we can, to your health-related storylines and are available to do that at your call. In fact, we'll probably have to have our own contest to be able to select out who is going to participate in the panel for awarding the prize because all of us are going to want to participate.

I am most pleased and proud to have you all as partners in public health. You don't think of yourselves that way, but as of now, that's what we consider you. We look forward to working with you closely. Good luck to all of you, and we look forward to selecting those awards and hearing from the various contestants next June. Thank you.

SONNY FOX: Thank you Dr. Koplan. Our current plans are that at the next Soap Summit in October 2000, the luncheon will be tied in with the awards ceremony. Each succeeding Soap Summit will then be the place where the awards will be given out, so it becomes a part and parcel of what we're doing. We are proud and pleased to be part of this project with the CDC.