Time to Help Set Policy for Our Healthcare Future

Healthy People is a program of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that sets health objectives for the nation for a ten-year period. The current set of objectives is referred to as Healthy People 2010, but as 2010 is fast approaching, the department is considering a new set of health priorities to target, and has heldnumerous public meetings to brainstorm the next stage.

The objectives typically cover preventable disease, increasing quality and length of life, and the elimination of health disparities across a range of focus areas. For example, Healthy People 2010 included an objective to “Reduce cesarean births among low-risk (full term, singleton, vertex presentation) women” and provided a 15% target c-section rate for first births, and 63% for births after previous cesarean. This target has not been met, with the CDC data from 19 states indicating that in 2006 – the most recent year of finalized data currently available – 23.5 of every 100 first, live births was by cesarean, and repeat cesarean rates were about 92%. It has been included again as-is for the 2020 objectives. Read full post at Women's Voices For Change.