Health is more than absence ...

Health is more than absence of disease; it is about economics, education, environment, empowerment, and community. The health and well being of the people is critically dependent upon the health system that serves them. It must provide the best possible health with the least disparities and respond equally well to everyone.
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 Joycelyn Elders

Quotes from the same author

Given a choice between hearing my daughter say "I'm pregnant" or "I used a condom", most mothers would get up in the middle of the night and buy them herself.
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 Joycelyn Elders
Health is more than the absence of disease. Health is about jobs and employment, education, the environment, and all of those things that go into making us healthy.
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 Joycelyn Elders
I'm against abstinence programs because I really consider "abstinence only" child abuse.
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 Joycelyn Elders
Condoms will break, but I can assure you that vows of abstinence will break more easily than condoms.
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 Joycelyn Elders
What I can do is to go out and talk about the problems and solutions, make people aware of the scope of the problems, get them to become advocates for a turnaround, and convince them to develop an action plan, targeted to their community, to deal with young people. [They need to] find out what the kids want to do - dances, midnight-basketball leagues.
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 Joycelyn Elders