Nation's top doctor visits Los Angeles, examines public health concerns

March 03--America's newly appointed top doctor made a house call to Los Angeles County on Monday to examine the region and to gather as much information as he could to help him assess the nation's most pressing public health concerns.

Dr. Vivek Murthy, who was confirmed in December as the 19th U.S. surgeon general, toured the new outpatient center of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Hospital in the Willowbrook neighborhood and spoke with community and faith leaders as well as public health officials on various health issues.

The visit to Los Angeles was Murthy's 17th stop on a cross-country listening tour, or what he dubbed house calls.

He said he was excited for the reopening of the overall community hospital, which was closed in 2007. Known then as King/Drew, the South Los Angeles hospital was shuttered after failing a review by the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. Its closure caused a wide gap in health care in the area. But Murthy also was concerned about a number of health challenges in Los Angeles County, including prescription drug abuse, childhood obesity, tobacco use and violence.

"What has struck me is despite all the challenges that we have with obesity, with chronic diseases, with substance abuse, with diabetes and other conditions, we also have extraordinary community leaders who are working extremely hard to build programs and sustain programs that can address these challenges," he said.

Murthy's visit also comes as the spread of measles in California continues. The outbreak stemmed from an infected visitor to Disney Parks in late December, and cases then spread across the Golden State and to more than a dozen other states nationwide. Most are in California, where the state's Department of Public Health said Monday that 131 cases have been confirmed.

Murthy said the measles vaccination rate is about 92 percent in the United States.

"I want to be very clear. I'm very concerned about the measles outbreak this time around," Murthy said. "Much of this spread could have been preventable if we had higher vaccination rates. My concern is we have pockets of where the vaccination rate is low. That poses a risk not only for those individuals but also for others in this country."

Murthy was nominated by President Barack Obama in November 2013. But his nomination was controversial because of his comments that guns are a public health concern. Surgeon generals are commissioned officers in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. By law, they hold the rank of vice admiral.

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