Building Capacity for Epidemiologic Surveillance of Alcohol and other Drug Problems in the US-Related Pacific Islands

Over the past decade, much attention has been focused on the health care needs of the roughly 500,000 individuals residing in the U.S. Associated Pacific Island jurisdictions (e.g., Guam, American Samoa, Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Federated States of Micronesia, Republic of Palau, and the Republic of the Marshall Islands). These six jurisdictions are culturally and politically distinct and are dispersed across an area of 60 million square miles in the western and south Pacific Ocean. Comparatively, the health of residents living in these island jurisdictions is much more compromised than for mainland Americans. The health care delivery systems are faced with problems of “epidemiologic transition”, that is, where health problems are seen that are typical of both the developing regions of the world (e.g., malnutrition, tuberculosis, dental caries, dengue fever, cholera) in addition to the health problems of the developed world (e.g., cancer, heart disease, diabetes).