Issue Brief

­Equity Concerns and Recommendations to Support Fair Practices in Sharing and Using Child Welfare Data

Issue BriefHealth Information and Data SharingMechanisms for Advancing Health Equity

June 6, 2025
by Emma Kaeser, Meghan Mead and Susan Fleurant

In recent years, federal, state, and local child welfare agencies have begun to develop data sharing policies and practices to support sharing child welfare data with other agencies. These agencies intend to use data sharing to enhance the government’s ability to coordinate and improve the provision of social services. This issue brief explores the relationships between child welfare, public health, data sharing, and racial and income disparities. It includes recommendations for agencies, community partnerships, and policy researchers to incorporate into the development of data sharing and use practices to reduce the risk of further perpetuating harm against vulnerable communities.

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­Restrictions on the Right to Travel for Out-of-State Abortion Care

Issue BriefReproductive Health and Equity 

May 28, 2025
by Kathleen Hoke and Naisha Mercury

As a result of the Supreme Court decision in Dobbs, advocates on both sides of the abortion issue turned to state constitutions to determine the contours of a right to abortion or to make clear no such right exists under state law. When abortion was on the ballot in 2022, voters in several states rallied to enshrine the right to abortion in state constitutions and rejected attempts to further restrict abortions in their states. In the wake of these successful ballot measures, state legislators throughout the country have sought to amend ballot initiative processes ahead of the 2024 elections. This fact sheet outlines recent proposed amendments by several states that are intended to thwart pro-abortion ballot initiatives.

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­Chronic Disease and Data Modernization – Opportunities (and Safeguards) For Enhanced Public Health Data Collection

Issue BriefHealth Information and Data SharingInjury Prevention and Safety

April 25, 2025
by Charles Curran

Renewed governmental focus on chronic disease prevention can provide a new impetus to enhance public health data collection for non-communicable diseases, building on recent progress in standardizing and modernizing infectious disease surveillance. Although public health has previously emphasized survey-based surveillance to assess chronic disease prevalence within communities, increased access to individual data in electronic health records could provide more timely and comprehensive information for responsive interventions. This resource reviews how public health authority generally supports expanding reporting requirements to encompass non-communicable diseases. However, as jurisdictions expand collection of individual data about chronic conditions, they should also ensure appropriate confidentiality safeguards in order to maintain public trust. 

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­State and Local Efforts to Declare Racism a Public Health Crisis – Western Region Update

Issue BriefMechanisms for Advancing Health EquityRacism as a Public Health Crisis

December 13, 2024
by Sara Rogers

This Issue Brief, part of a series of analyses looking at resolutions declaring racism a public health crisis in each region of the country, summarizes resolutions in the western U.S. states of Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Texas, Utah, and Washington. This analysis focuses primarily on resolutions passed by state and local governments, including city councils, county boards, city and county executives, school boards, and boards of health.

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­Equitable and Effective Data Sharing to Support Healthy Transitions for Youth During Reentry

Issue BriefHealth Information and Data SharingMechanisms for Advancing Public HealthMechanisms for Advancing Health EquityHealth Data Sharing and Privacy

December 5, 2024
by Emma Kaeser

Data sharing across correctional and community systems is complex and laden with risk, but failure to share data entails risk as well given the vital role data plays in effective pre- and post-release services to support youth during a particularly unsafe period. Thus, data sharing partners must not shy away from the admittedly hard work of navigating these challenges. Rather, partners must work towards effective and equitable cross-sector data sharing, recognizing the value of disclosure and the imperative of safeguarding privacy. This work necessitates community-driven, empowering data sharing that protects against further entanglement of punitive systems in health and social care.  This resource is intended to assist states implementing the youth-focused Medicaid and CHIP reforms in navigating these data sharing challenges. It identifies the important role of data sharing in reentry services and highlights the different roadblocks that those engaged in data sharing may encounter. It then identifies legal, ethical, and practical considerations for designing equitable data sharing systems that center the voices of impacted youth and protect against further entanglement of punitive systems in health and social care.

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­The Positive Impact of Doula Care and State Regulation of Doulas and Doula Care

Issue BriefMechanisms for Advancing Health EquityReproductive Health and Equity Maternal and Child Health

October 3, 2024

Fewer than 10 percent of births in the United States involve a doula. Increasing access to safe and effective doula care could decrease the high maternal morbidity and mortality rate in the U.S. This issue brief examines the role of doulas, state regulation of doulas, and how to expand doula care access and coverage through policy.

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­State and Local Efforts to Declare Racism a Public Health Crisis – Northern Region Summary­

Issue BriefMechanisms for Advancing Health EquityRacism as a Public Health Crisis

July 9, 2024
by Betsy Lawton

This Issue Brief, part of a series of analyses looking at resolutions declaring racism a public health crisis in each region of the country, summarizes resolutions in the northern U.S. states of Idaho, Iowa, Minnesota, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. This analysis focuses primarily on resolutions passed by state and local governments, including city councils, county boards, city and county executives, school boards, and boards of health.

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An Overview on Conducting a HIPAA Hybrid Entity Assessment for Local Public Health Departments

Issue BriefHealth Data Sharing and PrivacyFederal Privacy Laws

April 1, 2024
by Meghan Mead

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, Public Law 104-191 (HIPAA) applies to many local public health departments (LHDs). This issue brief helps public health practitioners, and their attorneys understand how HIPAA applies to LPHDs, the steps an LPHD must take to become a HIPAA hybrid entity, and discusses how these decisions directly impact data sharing, operations, compliance burden, and risk.

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­Promoting Health Equity in Communities Affected by Mass Incarceration—Addressing Legal Obstacles to Hiring Formerly Incarcerated Individuals as Community Health Workers

Issue BriefHealth and Health CareWorkforce ExpansionMechanisms for Advancing Health EquityMechanisms for Advancing Public Health

August 10, 2023
by Chris Alibrandi O’Connor and Colleen Healy Boufides

Individuals returning from incarceration have more healthcare needs than the general population but face numerous barriers to receiving care. Specially trained community members with lived experience of incarceration, serving in the role of community health worker (CHW), are uniquely effective at engaging returning community members in health services. This issue brief provides examples of key legal barriers that may be encountered by individuals with incarceration histories who are seeking employment as CHWs along with ways in which policymakers and health systems can address these barriers.

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Legal and Health Care Repercussions of the End of the National Public Health Emergency

Issue BriefHealth and Health CareMedicaidCOVID-19COVID-19 ResourcesCOVID-19 and Health EquityEmergency Legal Preparedness and Response

May 30, 2023
by Erica White, James G. Hodge, Jr. and Jennifer Piatt

This issue brief examines the end of multiple COVID-19 enhanced government authorities and the significant implications related to the cost and availability of COVID-19 vaccines and tests, telehealth and HIPAA flexibilities, Medicare and Medicaid expansions, private health insurance coverages, and immigration policies.

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Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals

Issue BriefEnvironment, Climate and Health

April 6, 2023
by Brianne Schell

The majority of abortions in the U.S. are medical abortions, a safe and effective method for early pregnancy, initiated by patients using a medication regimen. Medical abortions, also called chemical abortions or abortion pills, are one of the new battlegrounds on which political and legal wars are being fought. This fact sheet provides information on the drug regimen for medication abortion and current legal challenges to their use.

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State and Local Efforts to Declare Racism a Public Health Crisis – Eastern Region Update

Issue BriefRacism as a Public Health CrisisMechanisms for Advancing Health Equity

June 24, 2022
by Morgan Jones-Axtell

In summer 2020, as the disparities in COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations, and deaths continued to worsen and amid racial justice protests following the murder of George Floyd, cities, counties, states, and other agencies and organizations increasingly issued formal resolutions declaring racism a public health crisis. This Issue Brief is the third in a series of updated analyses looking at resolutions issued in each region of the country based on the Network’s regional offices. These analyses will focus primarily on state and local government entities, including city councils, county boards of commissioners (BOC), city and county executives, school boards, and boards of health (BOH).

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