MAHA-KY urges lawmakers to improve access to healthier food, holistic health care
A group of Kentucky’s lawmakers recommend the rest of the General Assembly work toward policy that improves access to healthy foods, has a focus on physical health and wellness, and allows health practitioners to identify and treat the root cause of disease.
The Make America Healthy Again Kentucky Task Force unanimously approved a set of recommendations at its final interim session meeting Dec. 16 just a few short weeks before the legislature reconvenes Jan. 6.
The task force’s guidance was informed by a summer’s worth of monthly meetings with the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, the University of Kentucky College of Medicine, Kentucky Hospital Association and other stakeholders in food systems, insurance and various health care fields.
Established by House Speaker David Osborne, R-Prospect, and Senate President Robert Stivers, R-Manchester, earlier this year, the task force is meant to bring national Make America Healthy Again principles of Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to the Bluegrass State.
In making policy recommendations, the 10-member group co-chaired by Sen. Shelley Funke Frommeyer, R-Alexandria, and Rep. Matt Lockett, R-Nicholasville, is meant to address Kentucky’s high rates of chronic disease and review strategies to improve health outcomes.
The task force also spent time in the interim discussing proposals passed in other states that make food labels on products with certain additives mandatory. There was also discussion in the interim about incorporating nutrition education at multiple grade levels and making physical activity mandatory for elementary schoolers.
In a news release from the House Majority Caucus, Funke Frommeyer said the task force has “elevated” discussion around root cause wellness, sometimes called functional medicine. Possible solutions the group reviewed, Funke Frommeyer said, will improve health outcomes in the Commonwealth.
“Improving Kentucky’s health outcomes is a priority and touches every facet of quality of life here in the Commonwealth,” Lockett said in the release. “We have a real opportunity to lead the nation in redefining what healthy communities look like, and these recommendations represent the first steps toward a stronger, healthier future for all Kentuckians.”
The recommendations include:
Healthy foods
- Support the “Food is Medicine” program, run by the Kentucky Hospital Association and the state’s Department of Agriculture to integrate food-based interventions in health care through medically tailor meals, nutrition incentives and other programs.
- Address the purchase of healthy foods with SNAP dollars. Lockett sponsored legislation earlier this spring he plans to file again that would prevent Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits from being used to purchase soft drinks, candy and junk food. Lawmakers are also looking to expand SNAP to cover hot prepared foods that would provide healthy options.
- Find ways to improve healthy meals in schools across the state through better procurement contracts, nutrition education, meal preparation and in supporting farm-to-school programs.
Physical health and wellness
- Strengthen physical education requirements for high school graduation.
- Increase accountability and transparency in local school wellness policies.
- Expand public awareness of healthy nutrition and lifestyles.
- Reduce public exposure to environmental toxins.
- Increase public awareness and input into the state’s health policies.
Functional medicine
- Increase health care provider education on integrating nutrition and diet strategies for improving health outcomes for chronic disease.
- Improve health insurance coverage of health programs that include functional medicine.
- Encourage the integration of functional medicine principles in preventative health initiatives.
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