I'm Dr. John Iskander,
and welcome to CDC's Beyond the Data.
Joining us today is Dr. Howard Spivak,
director of CDC's Division of Violence Prevention.
So, Howard, as part of today's Grand Rounds,
I think the central question for many people is,
"Can youth violence be prevented?"
And the answer is yes, youth violence can be prevented.
We have a rich, evidence base of strategies that work,
strategies focused on individual behavior, strategies focused
on family dynamics, strategies that work with communities
at the community level, and policy level approaches,
all of which, together, provide a very comprehensive approach
with a growing number of successes that show us
that these strategies work, not only as independent strategies,
but even more so when they're combined and put together.
So, a variety of things that actually do work.
Can you give us a couple of examples?
Yeah, I can give you examples at each of those levels.
At the individual level, there are approaches
that actually provide services.
They're often called wraparound services for youth,
particularly youth that are having difficulties
and need supports of various sorts.
Also at the individual level,
mentoring is an effective strategy
for addressing not only kids who are having difficulty,
but also promoting healthier behaviors.
At the school level, there are comprehensive approaches
that include curriculum, but also address issues
around the school environment
that greatly affect how kids behave in school;
what their value systems are; what their skill levels are,
in terms of dealing with conflict, dealing with anger.
There are strategies in schools that actually look
at the physical environment in schools and identify places
where violence is more likely to happen,
and there are things you can do
to reduce the risk in those areas.
At the community level, there are a spectrum of strategies
that focus on the built environment, the development
of green space, the engagement of youth
in community participation and community volunteerism
that give youth more of a sense
of connection to their communities.
And then there are strategies at the broader societal level,
some of which relate to economic development
and economic empowerment zone, some of which focus on alcohol
as a mediating factor addressing both density of alcohol outlets,
as well as the availability
of single-serve alcoholic beverages.
Now, obviously, each of these programs or a combination
of program has some costs associated with them.
Is the cost worth it?
The cost is very much worth it
and there are really two ways to look at this.
One of them is that many
of these programs have been evaluated
for their cost effectiveness,
and these programs have been shown to have anywhere
from three dollars to almost 50 dollars
in savings per dollar invested in these programs,
so that's the first piece of this.
The second piece is that there are, in fact,
a lot of resources in communities.
They're not necessarily being spent well.
They're often being spent on programs
where there is no evidence base or where, in fact,
there's an evidence base that shows
that the programs either don't work or,
in some cases, actually cause harm.
And if we were to more effectively realign
and redirect these resources into things we know work,
we could make a huge difference.
Okay, so, I'm thinking of, you know,
the average person-maybe they're not even
in the public health field, maybe they're a parent,
maybe they're a school board member-what can they do
in their school, their neighborhood, their community
to decrease youth violence?
As individuals, providing mentorship
for young people would be a great thing
that individuals can do.
We know that kids who receive good mentoring,
especially if it's consistent and is in place
for a reasonable amount of time,
has huge positive outcomes for young people.
So, that's at the individual level.
At the parent level, monitoring what your kids are doing,
having good healthy conversations with children
about these various issues, modeling good healthy behavior
for kids, 'cause kids learn from what they see,
so parents who display healthy conflict resolution skills are
teaching their children important lessons about how
to deal with conflict and how to deal with anger.
And then, at a community level, it's working with others
in your community to both acknowledge the fact
that violence is preventable and that there are, in fact,
things that can be done that are worth the investment
of resources at a community level.
And really being an advocate for children in your community
so that we invest the resources in young people in ways
that keep them healthy, as opposed to the huge cost
of providing services for them once they've gotten
into trouble.
Thank you very much, Dr. Spivak.
Please join us next month for CDC's Beyond the Data.