Last week, the California Funders Workgroup for Prevention and Equity, comprised of Blue Shield of California Foundation, The California Endowment, The California Wellness Foundation, Sierra Health Foundation, St. Joseph Community Partnership Fund, and Well Being Trust, released Beyond Screening: Achieving California’s Bold Goal of Reducing Exposure to Childhood Trauma, with technical support from Prevention Institute.
Beyond Screening emphasizes four key strategies to support healthy, safe, and equitable environments for children and their families:
- Strengthening economic supports to families, like expanding access to living-wage employment, paid family leave, and social safety-net programs
- Promoting healthy social norms that protect against violence and adversity
- Providing access to housing and healthy community development
- Ensuring every child gets a strong start in early childhood, childcare, school, and after-school settings
Beyond Screening makes the case that reducing the burden of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) by 50% within a generation—a goal set by California Governor Gavin Newsom and our state’s first ever surgeon general, Dr. Nadine Burke Harris—will require addressing societal and community-level factors that fuel stress and trauma like racism, a hostile climate for immigrants, housing displacement, and economic inequity.
Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) were already widespread before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, wreaking havoc on the health and economic stability of millions of families. An equitable recovery will require investing in healing and systemic approaches that enable healthy development of children in thriving communities.
We encourage you to share this report with your networks as we all look for ways to prevent adverse childhood experiences and support children and families through the COVID-19 pandemic and into the future. |
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