A coalition of 133 health-related groups in California are calling for $2 million from the governor and state legislature for a statewide task force to stamp out a mounting public health syndemic of HIV, hepatitis C and sexually transmitted diseases. The proposed task force would pool health resources from around the state to set target dates to end the HIV, hepatitis C and STD epidemics.
Disparities
Throughout California, low-income public-school students are guaranteed at least one free or low-cost healthy meal each school day. That same law doesn’t apply to public preschools or to child care programs operated by school districts or county offices of education that serve low-income children. But that could soon change.
More than 85,000 of California’s most vulnerable low-income residents, including those who are homeless and have been recently incarcerated, are now enrolled in a pilot project designed to link health care to social services.
Noting rising suicide rates and mental health problems among the state’s youth, a bill in the California Senate would require all new teachers to have mental health first-aid training.
In this country, we believe that our value and ability to contribute to society should not be based on how we look or how much money in our wallets. The Trump administration’s proposed public charge rule flouts these core values.
Many counties already offered free rides, but they were rarely used. A new state law requiring free transportation is connecting many more low-income Californians to care.
Undocumented immigrants in California are at high risk for mental health challenges, but local governments aren’t doing enough to ensure they get care, according to a new report.
More than 1 in 10 Latinos living in the Central Valley would not get counted in next year’s census if plans to add the citizenship question move ahead.
A California law that went into effect in 2016 allows pharmacists to prescribe, not just dispense, many forms of birth control. But three years in, only fifteen percent of pharmacies offer the option and too few women know about it.
Despite California’s leadership in expanding health coverage to a record number of Californians, we have a crisis that hardly anyone is addressing: Our state still fails to provide the quality—and quantity—of care needed by our largest ethnic group.