Prevention Policy Group
PHI’s Prevention Policy Group works in collaboration with partner organizations to advance health equity by advocating for policies and systemic changes that prioritize primary prevention of disease. Our current efforts focus on shaping food policy, securing sustained funding for community-based primary prevention and health equity initiatives, and regulating the emerging cannabis and hemp markets.
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Focus Areas
Chronic Disease Prevention, Communicable Disease Prevention, Healthy Communities -
Issues
Cannabis, Nutrition & Food Security, Physical Activity, Population Health, School-based Efforts -
Expertise
Coalition & Network Building, Evaluation, Health Education & Promotion, Outreach & Dissemination, Public Policy Advocacy, Public Policy Development, Research – Survey
Our Impact
See all Prevention Policy Group Impacts
- 10M pieces of personal protective equipment delivered in CA and WA
- 100+ jurisdictions using at least one best practice developed by Getting it Right from the Start
- 1.5M California residents protected by taxes that Sugar Alert helped to pass
Projects
Active Projects
- Medi-Cal Healthy Communities Initiative
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Today’s leading causes of premature illness and death are largely preventable. Ensuring access to quality health care is essential for treating those who are already sick; by investing in community-based, primary prevention, we can keep people from needing health care in the first place. The Medi-Cal Healthy Communities Initiative (MHCI) seeks to identify opportunities and generate support for investing in creating healthy community environments that further advance Medi-Cal’s new approach to reducing the health inequities that have long plagued our state and our nation.
- Health Equity and Racial Justice Fund
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The Health Equity and Racial Justice Fund (HERJ Fund, formerly the California Alliance for Prevention Funding) seeks to address structural racism and the associated deep-rooted social and health inequities as public health crises in California. The proposed HERJ Fund would create a statewide grant program that provides resources directly to non-profit community-based organizations, clinics, and tribal organizations (CBOs) to fill gaps in state investments by supporting efforts to transform the behaviors, institutions, and systems that disproportionately harm historically marginalized communities and create barriers to health and to opportunity. Learn more.
- Global Health Advocacy Incubator: Healthy Food Policy
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Nutrition and diet are fundamental building blocks to good health. Since 2014 the Prevention Policy Group has combined research and evidence-based approaches to promote and evaluate food policies through the lens of health equity and social justice that prevent noncommunicable disease and advance healthy diets. We are currently collaborating with the Global Health Advocacy Incubator on their work assessing policy options for advancing access to healthy foods.
- Getting it Right from the Start
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Getting it Right from the Start uses scientific research to identify and advocate for cannabis policy that advances public health and equity, prioritizing groups vulnerable to harms such as youth. We engage and support partners in our work to ensure that government and industry actions align with these priorities. Learn more.
Completed Projects
- Sugar Alert: San Francisco & San Jose
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This project was originally designed to assess the impact of the San Francisco warning label law. After the passage of the San Francisco SSB tax, and blockage in the courts of the warning label law, it shifted to evaluate the soda tax. This study has followed a cohort of San Francisco and San Jose residents from before the tax to two years afterward, examining beverage consumption, knowledge, attitudes and other issues.
- California Alliance for Prevention Funding
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The California Alliance for Prevention Funding (CAPF) coalition was founded in 2018 and consisted of 20 statewide organizations advocating to establish a California Wellness Trust, or other mechanism, to assure sustained, dedicated investment in preventing the leading causes of illness, injury, and premature death in California by addressing the root causes of these conditions in order to promote greater health equity, build healthier communities through community-based disease prevention and wellness efforts, and make healthcare dollars go further. Learn more.
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