State public health chief lauded in D.C.

Dr. Dora Anne Mills, head of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention, has earned the recognition of the American Medical Association for her work in improving Maine’s public health network.

Mills traveled with her family to Washington earlier this week to accept the Dr. Nathan Davis Award for Outstanding Government Service, which was presented at a special awards dinner on Tuesday night.

Eight recipients are honored each year. Mills was nominated for the prestigious award by a group of influential colleagues in Maine, including former Gov. Angus King, Commissioner Brenda Harvey of the state Department of Health and Human Services, former AMA president Dr. Robert McAfee of Portland, and others.

At the awards ceremony, the AMA President Dr. William Plested praised Mills’ “collaborative leadership on tobacco control and prevention” for the steep decline in Maine’s teen smoking rate and the state’s consistently strong funding for smoking prevention and cessation services.

Mills was also recognized for her aggressive planning for a projected worldwide influenza outbreak and for building the state’s public health system through the grant-funded Healthy Maine Partnerships program.

Reached for comment at her Washington hotel on Wednesday, Mills said she had no idea she was being considered for the award until she was notified of her selection about three weeks ago.

“I’m accepting as the head of an agency,” she said. “There are 420 people at Maine CDC who work day in and day out. If I look good, it’s because they make me look good.”

According to Harvey, Mills is well-liked and respected throughout the state.

“Dora is synonymous with public health in Maine,” Harvey said Wednesday. “Everyone speaks to her ability to talk to all Maine people.”

Mills said Maine’s public health system has improved under the leadership of the King and Baldacci administrations, supportive legislative leaders and a number of private-sector groups such as the Maine Medical Association and the Maine Cancer Society. Though some areas of the state are well-served, she said, public health efforts in Maine need to expand “without adding another layer of bureaucracy.”

To learn more about the Dr. Nathan Davis Award and its other recipients in 2007, visit www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/category/17308.html.