Walter Tsou, MD, MPH

By David Woods, PhD, FCPP

 
Despite the high-profile positions he's held as Health Commissioner of Philadelphia and as President of the American Public Health Association, Dr Walter Tsou is a pretty unassuming guy. An adjunct professor of family medicine and community health at Penn, he wears his erudition and his accomplishments lightly.

But that doesn't mean he isn't a passionate proponent of public health and a stalwart advocate for a single-payer healthcare system, serving on both the National Board of Public Health Examiners and national Board advisor to Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP).

At 60, he now focuses mainly on family life with his wife Jean Lee, a nephrologist, and his 13-year-old daughter, Casey, who definitely won't go into medicine, she says, because she hates the sight of blood. Coming relatively late to family life Walter notes wryly that he gets to read Modern Maturity and Parent magazine

Asked what’s given him the most professional satisfaction he unhesitatingly points to the hands-on practice of public health. A particular joy was when he served as deputy director for personal health services and medical director of the Montgomery County Health Department and helped to stamp out hepatitis B among  local schoolchildren. He also appreciated the autonomy that that job gave him, in contrast to his role as Philadelphia Health Commissioner where he came up against Mayor John Street’s bureaucracy.

Walter’s medical degree is from the University of Pennsylvania and his MPH from Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health. He started out in internal medicine, but wound up working in a public health clinic, and the rest, as they say, is history.

As for the Affordable Care Act, while he acknowledges that its introduction has been far from stellar, it's also not a simple matter to launch such a convoluted software program. In fact, he says, a single-payer system would not only be more streamlined but would encourage doctors to join organized medicine.

Of his rather low-key manner, he says that if you preen too much you can become a target. People like to shoot at targets, he says, and this is especially true for public health physicians who are highly visible. If they’re seen munching on hamburgers, drinking, or lighting cigarettes someone’s sure to jump on them.

One public health issue that could find Walter in the cross hairs is fracking. He believes that the current methodology which involves millions of gallons of water  creates a health risk. “We have to be careful,” he says, “and look to less dangerous ways of extracting shale.”

If the government has difficulty in introducing so-called Obamacare, is there any hope that it could run a national health program? Well, PNHP has some 18,000 members, and thinks it can. And Walter Tsou agrees, noting that the US is the only advanced country that doesn’t have such a program. The barriers, he believes, are the strong and well-heeled lobby groups in the pharmaceutical and private insurance industries.

Both Walter and his wife are of Chinese extraction and he serves on the board of the Asian Pacific Islander American Health Forum. Among his many accolades is the Public Health Recognition Award from the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, where he is a trustee. He believes that the College is a wonderful source of both social and educational activity. And you may see him at either. Just don't expect him to preen. He's better at asking questions than answering them … noting that his Myers-Briggs score suggests he would have made an  excellent journalist.

Since he and Jean enjoy the theater, ballet, and movies maybe Walter’s next career will be as an arts reporter or movie critic.

But he won’t tell everyone.

You can reach David Woods at hmi3000@comcast.net or at www.davidwoods.info