Health Reform

Staff Contacts | Health Reform Resources

Historic Health Reform Legislation

advocacy_books150 On March 23, 2010, President Obama signed health reform legislation to provide insurance coverage to the uninsured and reform the healthcare delivery system.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) strengthens local health departments and chronic disease prevention. It authorizes new funding for public health workforce training and mandates clinical preventive services to be covered by insurance plans.

View NACCHO's summary of public health provisions. Information is found below on health reform implementation, new resources available to your health department, and upcoming opportunities for health departments to provide input into the regulatory process.

Overview

Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act

This overview will provide summaries of the ACA, and an implementation timeline and fact sheets on different aspects of the law. More »

»	How Are Local Health Departments Responding to Health Reform?
	Local health departments face challenges and opportunities in response to the changing public health and clinical healthcare environment as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) is implemented. NACCHO has published a white paper outlining some of the challenges, opportunities, and potential strategies LHDs can take to address changes enacted by the ACA. Public Health Newswire profiled three local health department leaders; Rahul Gupta of Kanawha-Charleston Health Department (WV), Terry Allen of Cuyahoga County Board of Health (OH), and Lillian Shirley of Multnomah County (OR) about their experiences with ACA implementation.

»	Health Reform Resources
	NACCHO has compiled an extensive and up-to-date list of websites and other online resources that will help provide a better understanding of issues surrounding health reform. More » A PDF of the resource list is also available here.

»	Supreme Court Upholds Affordable Care Act
	On June 28, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the ACA. Five Justices agreed that the penalty for lack of health insurance is a kind of tax that Congress can impose using its taxing power and the individual mandate to have health insurance stands. Because the mandate survives, the court did not need to decide what other parts of the statute were constitutional, except for a provision that required states to comply with new eligibility requirements for Medicaid or risk losing their funding. On that question, the court held that the provision is constitutional as long as states would only lose new funds if they didn''t comply with the new requirements, rather than all of their funding. The Prevention and Public Health Fund and other public health provisions remain law. NACCHO signed on to two amicus (friend of the court) briefs supporting aspects of the law. More information: Supreme Court of the United States Kaiser Family Foundation June 28 Webinar on Supreme Court Decision American Public Health Association Harvard Law School Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation

»	Health Reform Slides
	Powerpoint presentations are available for download for your use in communicating about the health reform law and how it impacts local health departments. General overview presentation about health reform law Presentation about public health aspects of the health reform law

Grant Announcements

Announcements of grant funds associated with the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) can be found here.

Proposed Regulations

Health Reform Implementation

The next phase of health reform has the executive branch of government determining regulations or how the law will be implemented. This is an important but often overlooked phase during which decisions that can affect local health departments will be made. NACCHO will provide announcements of proposed regulations and NACCHO’s comments to them. More »

NACCHO Action

NACCHO Recommendations for Health Reform Implementation

NACCHO continues to weigh in on behalf of its members on various aspects of health reform implementation. Letters sent to the administration and Congress related to health reform are highlighted here. More »

»	NACCHO Press Release
	NACCHO Celebrates Prevention and Wellness in Health Reform