The City of St. Louis Department of Health’s vision is to make the City of Saint Louis a healthy environment where citizens realize their desire for longer, healthier and happier lives at home, at work and in their neighborhoods.
Our mission: To assure a healthy community through continuous protection, prevention and promotion of the public’s health. This is achieved by caring, qualified, culturally competent employees who are responsive and proactive to community needs.
What do we mean by Public Health?
The City of St. Louis Department of Health is the public health agency for the City. Not everyone understands what we mean by “public health”. Public health is credited with adding 25 years to the life expectancy of people in the United States in the 20th century. Yet ask your average citizen what public health is and their reply might be limited to: “health-care for low-income families”.
The real story is public health makes life better for all of us, all the time, through protection, prevention and promotion.
The St. Louis City Health Department would like to remind citizens how far we’ve come, how we got here and exactly what public health is: the active protection of our nation’s health and safety, credible information to enhance health decisions, and partnerships with local communities and organizations to promote good health.
We’ve come a long way since 1900 when life expectancy was just 45 years.
To check out more of what the St. Louis City Health Department has to offer, click here.