EMAIL TO PUBLIC HEALTH COMMITTEE CHAIRS IN
SUPPORT OF PWTF & SAPHE
To:
Cc:
[Insert the email addresses for your Rep and Senator]
Subject:
Support for Senate Bills 1293/1294 and House Bills 2012/1935 - Prevention & Wellness Trust Fund and State Action for Public Health Excellence (SAPHE) Program
Dear Chairwoman Comerford and Chairman Mahoney:
Please support the Prevention & Wellness Trust Fund (PWTF) and State Action for Public Health Excellence (SAPHE) Program!
PWTF focuses on preventing illness and injury before people are sick, rather than spending money on "sick care" after people are already ill. We know that people's health is influenced primarily by the conditions where they live, work, and play. Yet, we spend nearly $60 billion on health care in Massachusetts primarily to treat people after they're sick. PWTF is the first large scale initiative that invests in evidence-based community strategies to prevent illness and reduce health inequities. Between 2014-18, PWTF funded successful clinical-community partnerships that helped to keep residents healthy and bend the health care cost curve. Now we must pass legislation to continue this successful model.
SAPHE will provide essential training to the local public health workforce and support sharing of services across municipalities to increase capacity. Massachusetts is an outlier in how it approaches local public health, with no direct state funding and 351 municipal boards of health. As a result
, there is wide variation across towns in the degree of protections provided, the level of health funding per capita, and the level of training staff receive. Local health departments are responsible for a vast suite of protections that we all rely on to stay safe and healthy, from food safety in restaurants, safe facilities at public pools and children's camps, to communicable disease control and enforcement of tobacco regulations. We must strengthen our system to ensure equitable protections for all residents of the Commonwealth.
Sincerely,
[Your name and organizational affiliation]
[Contact info]
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