在我們進入第三個千年之際，公共衛生正面臨新出現和重新出現的疾病的挑戰。這種衛生轉變包括人口結構的變化和衛生服務對不斷變化的疾病模式的反應。然而，盡管正在進行的過渡考慮到“福利”和老齡化的慢性病，但它肯定也是眾所周知的危險因素“輸出”的結果。預防往往取決于公共衛生政策和基于證據的實施，而不是尋找新的危險因素。衛生公平是當今大多數國家和機構的公共衛生議程。不公平意味著不公平——但沒有什么比貧窮更不公平，也沒有任何流行病學風險因素比貧窮更強烈。在將貧窮和衛生需求的長期性和流行性引起世界良知的注意方面，一份公共衛生雜志可能是一個杠桿。我們不會避免披露這些價值前提。它們為公共衛生研究人員帶來了未來的挑戰。我們的目標是使這本雜志成為一個地方、國家以及全球衛生問題的論壇，我們希望認識到在使理論和方法更接近公共衛生努力方面所面臨的挑戰。我們一定會努力反映健康的多學科性，這已成為近年來全球公共衛生的特點。因此，流行病學家、衛生經濟學家和社會學家可在公共衛生的效力、成本效益以及社會和倫理影響方面，對不斷變化的公共衛生的概念和方法發展作出貢獻。自2000年1月以來，SJPH處于新的編輯管理之下。我們歡迎北歐和南歐對北歐以及國際公共衛生發展、基于課桌或實地的定量和定性研究的貢獻。我們的雄心是明確的，即培育和傳播公共衛生努力的有效成果，并盡我們最大的能力影響當前衛生研究的不平衡，即對大多數衛生問題的研究努力太少。

Public Health as we enter the third millennium, is facing challenges of new and re-emerging diseases. This health transition includes both changes in demographic patterns and the responses of health services to changing patterns of disease. However, while the ongoing transition allows for the chronic diseases of "welfare" and ageing it certainly also results from the "export" of well-known risk factors. Prevention often lies in the hands of public health policy and evidence-based implementation rather than in the search for new risk factors. Equity in health is on the public health agenda of most countries and agencies today. Inequity means unfairness - but nothing is as unfair as poverty, nor any epidemiological risk factor as strong. In bringing the chronic and pandemic nature of poverty and health needs to the attention of the world's conscience, a public health journal may be one lever. We will not avoid disclosing these value premises. They create a future challenge for public health researchers. Our ambition is to make this journal a forum for local, national as well as global health issues and we would like to recognise the challenge in bringing theory and methods nearer to public health efforts. We will certainly try to reflect the healthy multidisciplinarity that has become characteristic of public health globally in recent years. Epidemiologists, health economists and sociologists may thus contribute to conceptual and methodological development of the changing public health in terms of its efficacy, cost-effectiveness and social and ethical implications. Since January 2000 SJPH is under a new editorial management. We welcome contributions from North to South, on Nordic as well as International Public Health Developments, desk or field based studies, quantitative as well as qualitative. Our ambition is unequivocal - to foster and disseminate valid results from public health endeavours and, to the best of our ability, influence the current health research disequilibrium - that too little research effort is addressed to the bulk of health problems.