The New Haven Mental Health Outreach for MotherS (MOMS) Partnership™ is a collaboration of agencies across the city of New Haven, Connecticut that work together to support the well-being of mothers and families living in the city. This partnership created a social media application called “MoMba™,” which connects new mothers locally to promote healthy mother-infant interaction, social connectedness, and community engagement. New mothers may feel socially isolated after giving birth, thereby making it more difficult to form a healthy mother-infant bond with their baby. The application focuses on promotion of social support and capital, maternal-infant attachment, and skill building related to parenting. Representatives of the collaboration shared an overview on how this application harnesses technology to enhance social capital among low-income mothers at the September 2015 OFA Gateway to Opportunity convening.

SNAP to Skills will host the webinar Better Jobs and Increased Incomes: Integrating SNAP E&T into Career Pathways Programs on March 22, 2018 from 1:00 to 2:30 p.m. EST. The webinar will focus on how career pathways can help SNAP participants upgrade their skills and advance to higher paying jobs by completing training and obtaining credentials in industries with strong employment opportunities. Webinar participants will learn how SNAP E&T can integrate with career pathways programs to create expanded opportunities for SNAP participants, leverage other funding, and fill service gaps to increase impact. It will include opportunities to hear from specific communities on how they have integrated SNAP E&T with career pathways to create opportunities for participants to obtain better jobs and increase earnings.

In this report supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, Manatt Health explores the opioid and mental health crises and how cities and counties are implementing local initiatives to address the human and economic impact of untreated serious mental illness and substance abuse disorders. The report profiles 13 local programs that address homelessness, criminal justice, and the frequent use of first responder and hospital emergency departments. It examines both the community impact and local response initiatives, paying particular attention to areas with gaps in treatment, such as the homeless community, and outlines success factors of these local programs.

This blog post from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families (ACF) refers to an article written by Jerry Milner, associate commissioner of the Children’s Bureau and acting commissioner for ACF’s Administration for Children, Youth and Families. This article for The Chronicle of Social Change pertains to the Family First Prevention Services Act. The Act is legislation passed as part of the spending bill that changes the funding structure for the child welfare system by trying to prevent at-risk children from entering the foster care system. Milner praises the Act but concentrates on other actions that need to take place to get to true prevention.

This resource, from the National Research Center on Hispanic Children and Families, reviews trends related to family structure for low-income Hispanic mothers in urban areas using the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study. The data show differences in family life stability, psychosocial risk, parenting stress, co-parenting relationships, and support across foreign-born and U.S.-born Hispanics. Authors conclude that strengths and risks vary based on mothers’ nativity, which should be considered when developing interventions or programs.

This National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) article, authored by NIDA Director Dr. Nora Volkow, states that while the opioid crisis is a problem that can affect people from all walks of life, it has particularly impacted some of the poorest regions in the country where stress and other environmental and social factors may leave some individuals more vulnerable. Psychological factors such as increases in economic challenges and stress can play a role in addiction. Reasons may also include level of access to and the quality of health care received by people in economically disadvantaged areas. The article suggests that reversing the current opioid crisis and preventing future ones require not just addressing this issue from the supply-side, but will also entail addressing such issues as economic disparities, housing instability, poor education quality, and lack of access to quality health care--all areas that plague disadvantaged individuals, families, and communities.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention created this media toolkit to help partners communicate the importance of the flu vaccine. It includes posters, flyers, factsheets, and materials designed specifically for children, and images for use on social media. They are easily printable in PDF format, and some are available in both English and Spanish.

Socioeconomic status is often not taken into account when examining influenza rates in a geographic area. This study sought to explore this information and took place over the course of two different flu seasons; the study was a partnership among 14 states to examine influenza hospitalizations in geographic areas with census-tract level poverty. It was found that with this type of poverty, higher rates of severe outcomes and hospitalization from the flu occurred.

This study, published in the Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics Journal, details the vaccination rates and attitudes towards the influenza vaccine among a low-income community in Central New York State. A total of 1,041 people were surveyed as part of the study, and 655 were found to be unvaccinated for the current flu season. Of those unvaccinated, 312 indicated they did not plan to receive the vaccine, and 46% of these respondents chose not to receive it because of misconceptions about the vaccine. Of those who intended to receive the vaccine but had not yet done so, 95% stated they had not received it because of a lack of access.

This free resource from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provides information about American Indians and Alaska Natives (AI/ANs) and the flu and how to prevent it in an easy-to-read infographic. It is available in a printer file, poster file to print, or text file that can be read without the graphics.