Suggested readings for this activity:

1. Defining and Implementing a Public Health Response to Drug Use and Misuse

2. Public Health Model of Addiction and Recovery Implications

Throughout this lesson, you have analyzed the core public health functions and essential services. Now, you will apply this knowledge to evaluate the use of these principles in a public health intervention.

Step 1: Identify a public health intervention that was implemented in a specific community/country/region to address alcohol, tobacco, or illicit drug use disorders. You can use an intervention given in this resource or any other intervention of your choice.

Step 2: Prepare a 350 - 600 piece of writing that includes the following points:

• Briefly describe the characteristics of your chosen intervention. Consider the following questions:
  - What were the goals?
  - What was the target population?
  - Was the intervention successful or did it fail?  

• How were the core public health functions and essential services implemented in your chosen intervention?

• Identify any public health functions and essential services that were not implemented in the chosen intervention and suggest challenges or barriers that may have affected delivery of these functions and services.

• Indicate the role of leadership principles at each stage of the intervention in delivering the core public health functions and essential services.

Step 3: To share your work, click on the button “Add a new discussion topic” located at the bottom of the screen. Include the name of the public health achievement you have selected as the subject and paste your work in the “message” box. Make sure to reference others’ intellectual property when necessary. All references should follow 7th Edition APA formatting; see the resource on the Himmelfarb Health Sciences Library for instructions: APA citation resource (N.B. references are excluded from word counts).

Step 4: To complete the activity, you will need to comment on at least one post made by your peers, respectfully and professionally. Be sure that your post engages your peers' ideas by including a reflection on their comments, sharing ideas of other potential difficulties and parties involved, or asking thought-provoking questions. If a peer comments on your posting, please reply. To post a reply, click on the particular discussion, then click on “reply.”

OPTIONAL Step 5: Interact (10 minutes)

If you would like to, you can reply to your peers' posts in a respectful and professional manner. Ensure that your post engages your peers' ideas by including a reflection on their comments, sharing ideas of other potential difficulties and parties involved, or asking thought-provoking questions. If a peer comments on your posting, please reply. To post a reply, click “Reply” on a particular discussion, write your feedback and then click on “Post to forum.”