New year, new momentum for advancing health through justice
Dear colleagues,
This month many tectonic plates shifted. Some of those shifts are creating new opportunities to promote Whole Person, Whole Family, Whole Community health and wellbeing. Other events reinforce how much foundational work remains to be done.
At this moment, MLPB is especially honored to partner with leading-edge communities of care who recognize that comprehensive, human-centered care must be continuously informed by families’ legal rights, risks and remedies. There can be no meaningful progress on health equity absent systematic attention to the legal environments — both visible and invisible — that impact individuals, families and populations.
Thank you to our partners for embracing legal education and problem-solving as a core health promotion strategy — and for recognizing that access to justice transcends sectoral silos. We all are part of the access to justice community.
Warmly,
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| Samantha Morton CEO |
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In Other News: Questions about how ongoing, seismic changes in federal law and policy impact the people you serve? Visit MLPB’s Digital Digest for curated information on evolving resources, benefits, and legal protections.
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- New blog! In a recent CSSP blog, Samantha Morton joins DULCE Learning Network colleagues from Neighborhood Legal Services of Los Angeles County and Vermont Legal Aid in sharing thoughts on how Legal Partnering is a Dose of Prevention. Learn more about the growing evidence base for, and conceptual roots of, Legal Partnering for Child & Family Health!
- Connect with us! MLPB will join colleagues from The Children’s Trust at the 2021 National Home Visiting Summit next month, presenting on A Legal Partnering Roadmap from Evaluation of Need to Successful Intervention. Session set for Friday, 2/26/2021 from 2-2:45pm. Thanks for hosting this important dialogue, Start Early!
- All hands on deck! Thank you to Roger Williams University School of Law for facilitating Alternative Winter Break student placements with MLPB! We were delighted to host Kamila Hussain (2L), Harrison Levine (1L), Brian Murphy (1L) and Ruth Nwauche (2L) for an immersive preventive law experience earlier this month.
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Sign of the times?
New national research, policies and recommendations that point to the power and urgency of prevention
- CMS: CMS Issues New Roadmap for States to Address [SDOH] to Improve Outcomes, Lower Costs, Support State Value-Based Care Strategies (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, Jan. 7, 2021)
- NBER: Housing Precarity & the COVID-19 Pandemic: Impacts of Utility Disconnection and Eviction Moratoria on Infections and Deaths Across US Counties (National Bureau of Economic Research, Jan. 2021)
- U.S. Surgeon General: Community Health and Economic Prosperity: Engaging Business as Stewards and Stakeholders (Executive Summary of A Report of the Surgeon General, Jan. 2021)
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Care Delivery & Financing Transformation
- State Must Write New Medi-Cal Contracts to Advance Health Equity (California Health Care Foundation, Jan. 20, 2021)
- Money Moves the Mare: The Response of Community-Based Organizations to Health Care’s Embrace of Social Determinants (The Milbank Quarterly, Jan. 11, 2021)
- How Can State Legislation Promote Value In Health Care? Three Innovative Models (Health Affairs Blog, Jan. 6, 2021)
- An Ounce of Prevention Is Still Worth a Pound of Cure, Especially in the Time of COVID-19 (Preventing Chronic Disease – Public Health Research, Practice, and Policy, Vol. 18, E03, Jan. 2021)
- To Correct Population Health Disparities, Reinvigorate Public Health Systems: The Continuing Lessons of COVID-19 (Health Affairs Blog, Dec. 17, 2020)
- Reflections on the Five Laws of Integrating Medical and Social Services — 21 Years Later (The Milbank Quarterly, Dec. 15, 2020)
Early Childhood
- Optimizing Health and Well-Being for Women and Children (Health Affairs Commentary, Jan. 21, 2021)
- Infant Health Disparities Emerge After 20 Years of Improvement (Patient Care Access News, Dec. 10, 2020)
Employment, Food & Income
- Addressing Child Hunger When School Is Closed — Considerations during the Pandemic and Beyond (The New England Journal of Medicine, Jan. 20, 2021)
- Mass. residents receiving SNAP benefits will get boost from stimulus bill. Will it be enough? (Boston Globe, Jan. 16, 2021)
- Workers to get a boost in 2021 as new laws take effect Jan. 1 (Boston Globe, Dec. 30, 2020)
- An underground food pantry in Boston draws needy families, and the city’s disapproval (Boston Globe, Dec. 25, 2020)
- #BlackTaxpayersMatter: Anti-Racist Restructuring of U.S. Tax Systems (ABA Human Rights Magazine, Dec. 14, 2020)
Housing & Health
- For good health outcomes, we need good housing incomes (Boston Globe, Jan. 23, 2021)
- She Works Two Jobs. She’s Still Facing Eviction (New York Times, Jan. 13, 2021)
- Griffin, O’Reilly & Sosin: Housing is Health, and Vermont Needs More (Vermont Digger, Jan. 3, 2021)
- The Preventive Effect of Housing First on Health Care Utilization and Costs Among Chronically Homeless Individuals (The Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts Foundation, Dec. 22, 2020)
- Humane Housing (Thriving Together, Jul. 2020)
Immigrant Health
- The US Must Prioritize Vaccine Distribution to Undocumented Immigrants and Immigrants in Detention Centers (Health Affairs Blog, Jan. 11, 2021)
- Anticipated “Chilling Effects” of the Public-Charge Rule Are Real: Census Data Reflect Steep Decline in Benefits Use by Immigrant Families (Migration Policy Institute, Dec. 2020)
- Coronavirus Disease 2019 and the Case to Cover Undocumented Immigrants in California (Health Equity, Nov. 25, 2020)
Older Adult Health
- Actualizing Better Health and Health Care for Older Adults (Health Affairs Commentary, Jan. 21, 2021)
- Incorporating Health Equity Into An Initiative To Transform Care For Older Adults (Health Affairs Blog, Jan. 14, 2021)
- Tracking Progress on Person-Centered Care for Older Adults: How Are We Doing? (Center for Consumer Engagement in Health Innovation, Jan. 13, 2021)
- Healthy Aging Data Report: Highlights from Rhode Island, 2020 (Rhode Island Office of Healthy Aging, 2020)
