The Ohio Academy of Family Physicians (OAFP) advocacy team monitors healthcare related legislation, rule changes, and legislative updates for Ohio’s family physicians.
To access the OAFP Bill Tracker, visit the OAFP Public Policy webpage and click on the Bill Tracker icon.
Read on for this week’s updates and contact Advocacy Coordinator Kaela Springhetti with questions or for ways to get involved.
Speak Out: Defend Vaccine Science and Public Health
Source: American Academy of Family Physicians
The American Academy of Family Physicians (AAFP) urges you to take action to support access to and public trust in vaccines, one of the most effective public health interventions in history.
In a deeply concerning move, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has dismissed all 17 members of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), the expert panel responsible for making science-based vaccine recommendations for the nation. This unprecedented action threatens to undermine decades of progress in vaccine safety, efficacy, and public trust.
At the same time, HHS has announced changes to COVID-19 vaccine recommendations for children and pregnant women. These developments make it more urgent than ever to remind Congress that vaccines are safe, cost-effective, and essential to protecting public health.
Routine childhood vaccinations between 1994 and 2023 have prevented approximately 508 million cases of illness, 32 million hospitalizations, and over 1.1 million deaths. These efforts have saved the U.S. healthcare system an estimated $540 billion in direct medical costs and $2.7 trillion in broader societal costs. Vaccines save lives. That’s why the AAFP supports universal access to immunizations regardless of socioeconomic or insurance status and opposes efforts by the administration to undermine access to and confidence in vaccines.
Please take two minutes to participate in this Speak Out. Together, we can ensure a stronger healthcare system for all.
Fluoride in Drinking Water, Food Dyes, Forever Chemicals Targeted by Ohio Lawmakers
Source: The Columbus Dispatch
Ohio lawmakers are talking about banning certain food dyes, giving local governments a say on water fluoridation, bringing back the presidential fitness test, and other items on the Make America Healthy Again (MAHA) movement’s wish list.
The MAHA movement, led by Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is a coalition of doctors, environmentalists, vaccine skeptics, moms, and others who are focused on chronic diseases, farming, and food production.
A bill pending in the Ohio House aims to eliminate certain dyes and additives in foods Ohioans eat and ban intentionally added forever chemicals in a long list of everyday products such as cookware, makeup, carpet, and tampons.
And it would weaken a water fluoridation law that has been on the books for 56 years.
Since 1969, Ohio law has required public water systems serving more than 5,000 customers to add fluoride. Studies showed it prevents tooth decay, though some have viewed fluoride added to public water systems as forced medication.
State Representative Munira Abdullahi (D-Columbus, OH) said preventing tooth decay is important given that dental care is out of reach for many without insurance. She asked the bill sponsor, Justin Pizzulli (R-Scioto County, OH), why fluoridation should be permissive when it is effective.
Rep. Pizzulli said decisions about what goes into public water should be made at the local level. He noted that there is a childhood obesity problem but putting weight loss drugs into public drinking water would be considered a radical idea.
Read the full article in The Columbus Dispatch.
Federal Medicaid Cuts Could Lead to Rural Hospital Closures, Research Finds
Source: Health Policy Institute of Ohio
Cuts to Medicaid and other federal health programs proposed in President Donald Trump’s budget plan would rapidly push more than 300 financially struggling rural hospitals toward a fiscal cliff, according to researchers who track the facilities’ finances.
The hospitals would be at a disproportionate risk of closure, service reductions, or ending inpatient care, according to a report authored by experts from the University of North Carolina, following a request from Senate Democrats, who released the findings publicly recently.
The study found that 11 hospitals in Ohio are at risk of closing.
President Trump’s budget plan contains nearly $800 billion in Medicaid cuts, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. House Republicans passed the bill in late May, and it now awaits Senate consideration.
The proposed cuts to Medicaid raise the stakes for rural hospitals nationwide, many of which already operate on razor-thin, if not negative, margins. Diminished reimbursements from the state-federal health insurance program for those with low incomes or disabilities would further erode hospitals’ ability to stay open and maintain services for their communities — populations with more severe health needs than their urban counterparts.
“It’s very clear that Medicaid cuts will result in rural hospital closures,” said Alan Morgan, CEO of the National Rural Health Association, a nonprofit advocacy and research organization.
Republican Lawmakers in Ohio to Propose Total Abortion and IVF Ban
Source: The Ohio Capital Journal
Ohio Republican lawmakers are planning to introduce a bill that would completely ban and criminalize abortion, IVF and some forms of contraception.
Anti-abortion advocate Austin Beigel, who works for End Abortion Ohio, told WEWS/OCJ exclusively that new legislation is about to be introduced to overturn the state’s 2023 constitutional amendment to protect access to abortion, fertility treatments, contraception, miscarriage care, and the decision to continue a pregnancy.
“All it does is simply identify the preborn human being as a person under the law,” Beigel said.
This is an effort we have been following through on for years, as Austin Biegel has pushed legislators to introduce his bill. He is working with Republican state Representatives Levi Dean, (R-Xenia, OH) and Jonathan Newman, (R-Troy, OH) on a total abortion ban using the U.S. Constitution’s equal protection clause to supersede Ohio’s constitutional amendment.
Rep. Dean, a plumber, and Rep. Newman, a pastor, are both freshman lawmakers.
Austin Beigel says they have several other cosponsors.
“We are currently denying human beings of their personhood of the equal protection of the law,” Austin Beigel said.
He believes the Constitution would designate life at conception. The legislation, one that doesn’t have a number assigned to it yet, would ban all forms of abortion, regardless of rape or incest. It would outlaw IVF and some forms of contraception like IUDs. If passed, women who have abortions would be charged with homicide.
The only exception would be if there was an immediate life-saving emergency or if there was a spontaneous miscarriage.
As we have covered this effort through the years, nonpartisan legal experts have cast doubt on the legitimacy of the 14th Amendment being used to outlaw abortion.
Asked whether this would be going against the voters, Austin Beigel said, “It goes against the majority opinion of the people of Ohio, and that is something that we are proud of, because there have been many times in our country’s history where the people have asked for something evil — slavery was once legal in this country.”
Read the full article in The Ohio Capital Journal.