The COVID-19 pandemic has exasperated challenges around access to nutritious and affordable foods. In response, the federal government has taken action to increase funding and access to programs to strengthen food security.
While communities transition from emergency response to long-term monitoring and recovery, the federal government and states are taking legislative action to improve emergency preparedness capabilities.
Predictions regarding how the health system would be impacted in the event of a U.S. default paint a grim picture for the country and for public health.
Accompanying an infusion of federal funding, states are considering several policy changes to strengthen the public health workforce and address challenges within the health care workforce.
Hearing the Hill astho, association of state and territorial health officials, opioid crisis, covid-19 funds, public health, public health data and workforce, american rescue plan, promoting health, drug overdose death, coronavirus ...
On the 32nd anniversary of the ADA, this blog post explores state legislation around the country that supports people living with disabilities.
Under the Tenth Amendment, states have the power to protect the health and welfare of their populations, including the authority to implement isolation and quarantine orders to limit the spread of disease. This post is an examination of ...
On Aug. 23, 2021, the FDA announced full approval of Pfizer and BioNTech’s mRNA vaccine for COVID-19. ASTHO has answers to five key questions about the approval and what it means for state and territorial health officials: What does the ...
Economic security and well-being, job stability, access to safe and affordable housing, access to healthy and nutritious foods, and access to resources to manage mental and physical health—all of these things impact individual, family, and ...
The COVID-19 pandemic introduced new challenges for screening children’s blood lead levels, as screening rates across the country dropped during stay-at-home orders. A substantive federal policy change and provisions in the Infrastructure ...
As leaders of their state agency, state and territorial health officials can be named parties in lawsuits alleging that an action taken by a public health agency was unlawful. These officials are typically sued in their “official ...
The ASTHO State Health Policy team provides brief updates on 5 of the ten state health policy issues to watch in 2022: public health authority, immunization, data privacy and modernization, public health workforce, and health equity.
Policies that broadly define "vaccine" expand access to life saving immunization products.
As COVID-19 continues to spread across the country, increased attention has been given to how schools, colleges, and universities can safely reopen for the upcoming 2020-2021 academic year. To note, many schools and institutions closed in ...
Scientists are working quickly to develop a safe and effective vaccine to provide immunity to COVID-19. Once a vaccine is approved, it will likely be imperative for states to authorize as many health care professionals to administer it, ...
To help break the chain of COVID-19 infections, state and local health departments are conducting disease investigations and contact tracing, core tools of public health practice used to combat the spread of communicable diseases. This ...
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, states are using their emergency powers to authorize a variety of social distancing measures. This post is a summary of executive orders that have led to the closure of many businesses and nonprofit ...
COVID-19 has revealed the stark reality of racial and ethnic health disparities that exist nationally. Black and Hispanic Americans were nearly three times more likely to die from COVID-19 than white Americans. Black and Hispanic Americans ...
As COVID-19 spread across the country, governors and health officials invoked their emergency powers to order physical distancing measures designed to reduce social interactions and slow the spread of the disease. Several of these ...