In this week’s podcast, the National Association of County and City Health Officials’ Government Affairs team members Adriane Casalotti and Kerry Allen caught up on the busy summer, which started out at NACCHO360, our annual conference. They covered two recent “wins” in administrative advocacy: the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) public health workforce funding opportunity and a repeal of the so-called “public charge” rule NACCHO had opposed during the last administration. They also discussed the Inflation Reduction Act, which expanded no-cost vaccine coverage for adults in Medicare and Medicaid and made $369 billion in climate change investments. Finally, they updated the current state of play in Washington as Congress works on a way forward on a short-term funding bill that will kick negotiations on full fiscal year 2023 appropriations to after the mid-term elections.
In recognition of National Preparedness Month, the podcast also featured a discussion about the future of CDC’s Public Health Emergency Preparedness (PHEP) program, which marks its 20th year in 2022. Ben Robison, Health Commissioner for the Wood County Health Department in Ohio, joined the podcast to talk about the importance of PHEP locally, how the program might evolve in the future, and how local health officials can get involved in advancing PHEP’s evolution in their jurisdictions.
