The Public Health Code of Ethics is a set of professional standards and expectations intended for public health practitioners throughout the feld. In 2002, a code entitled Principles of the Ethical Practice of Public Health was developed by a team of public health practitioners engaged in a project with the Public Health Leadership Society.
The American Public Health Association adopted the principles, and they were published in the American Journal of Public Health. At that time, it was already recognized that the feld of public health was experiencing dynamic growth and that the code would best serve the feld if it were occasionally reexamined and possibly revised. Now, as the feld of public health enters the era of Public Health 3.0, in which public health practitioners and programs prioritize social determinants for health and interact with a growing diversity of partners, it is important to reexamine and reemphasize public health’s commitments to ethical practice and public service.