Staff Reports
The Florida Senate’s budget proposes “harmful proviso language and a $19 million funding cut” to Florida Healthy Start, the program said Monday.
If passed, it “will devastate the program’s ability to provide essential services that support healthy pregnancies and outcomes for Florida’s most vulnerable families.”
Since Healthy Start was created in 1991, Florida has seen a 35 percent decrease in infant mortality, due in part to services and programs provided by Healthy Start coalitions, available in all 67 Florida counties.
This proposed $19 million cut makes up nearly a third of Healthy Start’s budget and would eliminate critical community intervention and prenatal education and support services for thousands of high-risk pregnant women and infants across the state.
As the Florida Senate budget conference reviews this proposal, the future of Healthy Start and its critical services to thousands of mothers and infants in every county of Florida are in jeopardy, the program said.
