American Academy of Pediatrics

Last night my colleague Mary Claire Walsh, MS and I had the honor to represent the American Academy of Pediatrics, our talented staff and partners at the 2026 Silver Anvil Awards of the Public Relations Society of America, where our vaccine confidence and rapid response campaign was awarded the 2026 Best of Silver Anvils Award. I'm so proud of the work of our talented staff and our strategic partners. This campaign has been a focus of our work at the AAP for the past year, during an incredibly challenging time. Immunizations help children and entire communities stay healthy, and parents need accurate, trustworthy information to make the best decisions for their family. To be recognized by the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) in this way is incredibly meaningful as we continue this essential work. Thank you to our partners M. Harris & Kern , Precision , Upswing Research & Strategy , psa3 and FrameWorks Institute and all my AAP colleagues who have contributed so meaningfully to this project this year. I'm proud to work alongside all of you!

Our partnership with Kenya Paediatric Association has been through so many seasons together, traversing vaccine advocacy, early child development, smoking prevention for over a decade. Proud to have Sherri L. Smith, MPH represent American Academy of Pediatrics at this most recent event in our journey together.

The National Academy of Medicine 's (NAM) Building Trust in Health Science Through Community Partnership and Lived Experience Action Collaborative (BTHS) recently gathered for our first in-person convening at the National Academy of Science in Washington, DC. The irony of our Action Collaborative posing in the NAS Board room with this portrait of POTUS 16 depicting the 1863 founding of the National Academy of Medicine was not lost on this distinguished and diverse group of interdisciplinary scholars, community engaged researchers and collective thought leaders. Kudos and thanks to the hardworking Building Trust in Health Science staff, Amy Gyau-Moyer, MS, MBA, MSW, MS-DRL, Shaneah Taylor, Elisabeth Solomon ; the support of RWJF Chief Scientific Officer Alonzo Plough Ph.D, MPH ; and the vision of The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine President, Victor Dzau . https://lnkd.in/eu_42cuY American Academy of Pediatrics | RWJF | GW Institute for Socioeconomic Opportunity (ISEO) | The George Washington University- Milken Institute School of Public Health

A pediatrician can’t fix what a zip code already decided. The American Academy of Pediatrics just released updated state-by-state numbers, and the overlap is striking. Children in poverty, children without health insurance, children in immigrant families, children navigating school in a language not spoken at home. These are often the same children in the same zip codes. You can see it on the maps. Layered disadvantage shaping outcomes long before a pediatrician enters the picture. That is the context behind every clinical guideline AAP publishes, every policy statement, every piece of advocacy work carried out on behalf of 67,000 pediatricians. This is why I start donor conversations with systems. The zip code a child is born into still predicts too much about their health, whether they have coverage, whether their family can navigate the system, and whether small problems become chronic ones. That is an infrastructure problem. Most philanthropy is still organized around diseases and named programs. They also sit downstream. If the underlying system is strained, fragmented, or underfunded, the outcomes will be too. P.S. If you're thinking about where your giving can have the most structural impact on children's health, I'd love to have that conversation: https://lnkd.in/gpGzWhZR