Name: How We Reported ‘Underfunded And Under Threat’
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How We Reported ‘Underfunded And Under Threat’

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This story also ran on .To assess in the United States, KHN and The Associated Press analyzed data on government spending and staffing at national, state and local levels.What reporters found was a mix of survey and budget data, each measuring a slightly different concept of “public health.”Some datasets track only state public health systems, not agencies that operate at a county, city or regional level. Other data, including some from the U.S. Census Bureau, covers spending on all non-hospital health care. Public health efforts are mixed in with the costs of providing local medical transportation, running community clinics and offering mental health services.Jun 29The U.S. public health system has been starved for decades and lacks the resources necessary to confront the worst health crisis in a century. Read the investigation from KHN and The Associated Press.The lack of comprehensive data specifically about public health makes assessing community programs, agencies and staffing levels difficult, experts say. Public health information is scattered and can’t be easily compared, unlike data about hospitals and medical treatment, according to Betty Bekemeier, a public health systems researcher and professor at the University of Washington. She is seeking to fix this as the leader of a to standardize local health department spending data.“We will not be able to improve our systems if we don’t have a better idea of how it works,” she said.KHN and AP calculated 2016-18 average annual state spending directly on public health initiatives using the . To create the dataset, a team of researchers encoded data from the Census Bureau’s “,” isolating public health costs to get the clearest sense of what governments spend only on public health efforts.The data includes spending by all state agencies and their transfers to local governments. To account for inflation for this and all spending data, KHN and the AP adjusted amounts to 2019 dollars using a price deflator from the Bureau of Economic Analysis targeted toward government expenses.A decade of data on state public health agencies’ expenditures and full-time equivalent staffing came from the . The data was reported directly by the state public health agencies through a national survey.When creating national percentage change estimates, reporters excluded a handful of states missing comparable spending or staffing data.The analysis included census from state and local governments to compare spending on non-hospital health with other priorities such as policing and highway construction and maintenance.At the local level, the National Association of County and City Health Officials’ “” surveys local health departments every three years and weights answers to account for nonresponse.Beyond that, some states collect local health department spending and staffing data. Reporters used detailed data on local health departments in Florida, Minnesota, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio and Washington — along with — to examine per capita trends over time.Finally, AP statehouse reporters posed an identical set of questions to states to get a sense of recent and upcoming budget and staffing changes to state public health departments. The AP gathered responses from 43 states.July 1, 2020To assess in the United States, KHN and The Associated Press analyzed data on government spending and staffing at national, state and local levels.What reporters found was a mix of survey and budget data, each measuring a slightly different concept of “public health.”Some datasets track only state public health systems, not agencies that operate at a county, city or regional level. Other data, including some from the U.S. Census Bureau, covers spending on all non-hospital health care. Public health efforts are mixed in with the costs of providing local medical transportation, running community clinics and offering mental health services.Jun 29The U.S. public health system has been starved for decades and lacks the resources necessary to confront the worst health crisis in a century. Read the investigation from KHN and The Associated Press.The lack of comprehensive data specifically about public health makes assessing community programs, agencies and staffing levels difficult, experts say. Public health information is scattered and can’t be easily compared, unlike data about hospitals and medical treatment, according to Betty Bekemeier, a public health systems researcher and professor at the University of Washington. She is seeking to fix this as the leader of a to standardize local health department spending data.“We will not be able to improve our systems if we don’t have a better idea of how it works,” she said.KHN and AP calculated 2016-18 average annual state spending directly on public health initiatives using the . To create the dataset, a team of researchers encoded data from the Census Bureau’s “,” isolating public health costs to get the clearest sense of what governments spend only on public health efforts.The data includes spending by all state agencies and their transfers to local governments. To account for inflation for this and all spending data, KHN and the AP adjusted amounts to 2019 dollars using a price deflator from the Bureau of Economic Analysis targeted toward government expenses.A decade of data on state public health agencies’ expenditures and full-time equivalent staffing came from the . The data was reported directly by the state public health agencies through a national survey.When creating national percentage change estimates, reporters excluded a handful of states missing comparable spending or staffing data.The analysis included census from state and local governments to compare spending on non-hospital health with other priorities such as policing and highway construction and maintenance.At the local level, the National Association of County and City Health Officials’ “” surveys local health departments every three years and weights answers to account for nonresponse.Beyond that, some states collect local health department spending and staffing data. Reporters used detailed data on local health departments in Florida, Minnesota, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio and Washington — along with — to examine per capita trends over time.Finally, AP statehouse reporters posed an identical set of questions to states to get a sense of recent and upcoming budget and staffing changes to state public health departments. The AP gathered responses from 43 states.Copy HTMLWe encourage organizations to republish our content, free of charge. Here’s what we ask:You must credit us as the original publisher, with a hyperlink to our khn.org site. If possible, please include the original author(s) and “Kaiser Health News” in the byline. Please preserve the hyperlinks in the story.It’s important to note, not everything on khn.org is available for republishing. If a story is labeled “All Rights Reserved,” we cannot grant permission to republish that item.Have questions? Let us know atThank you for your interest in supporting Kaiser Health News (KHN), the nation’s leading nonprofit newsroom focused on health and health policy. We distribute our journalism for free and without advertising through media partners of all sizes and in communities large and small. We appreciate all forms of engagement from our readers and listeners, and welcome your support.KHN is an editorially independent program of KFF (Kaiser Family Foundation). You can support KHN by making a contribution to KFF, a non-profit charitable organization that is not associated with Kaiser Permanente.Click the button below to go to KFF’s donation page which will provide more information and FAQs. Thank you!Go Back

This story also ran on .To assess in the United States, KHN and The Associated Press analyzed data on government spending and staffing at national, state and local levels.What reporters found was a mix of survey and budget data, each measuring a slightly different concept of “public health.”Some datasets track only state public health systems, not agencies that operate at a county, city or regional level. Other data, including some from the U.S. Census Bureau, covers spending on all non-hospital health care. Public health efforts are mixed in with the costs of providing local medical...

How We Reported ‘Underfunded And Under Threat’

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