826 - The Success of Rx Kids, Flint's Infant Cash Prescription Program
Public Health On Call
The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
4.6 • 644 Ratings
🗓️ 4 December 2024
⏱️ 20 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
About this episode:
Ten years ago, Flint, Michigan was in the headlines for its catastrophic water crisis. Now, it's on the map for a very different public health story: the success of the country's first unconditional cash program for expecting mothers and babies in their first year of life. The concept is not new, however—it's rooted in decades of evidence that cash programs help address root causes of poverty and can truly give kids a better start in life. Note: This episode was recorded in late October, prior to the 2024 presidential election. Note: Donations to Rx Kids can be made via GiveDirectly.
Guest:
Dr. Mona Hanna is a pediatrician, the associate dean for public health at Michigan State University College of Human Medicine, and the director of Rx Kids.
Dr. Miriam Laker-Oketta is the global director of research for GiveDirectly—the program that administers Rx Kids.
Host:
Lindsay Smith Rogers, MA, is the producer of the Public Health On Call podcast, an editor for Expert Insights, and the director of content strategy for the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Show links and related content:
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Rx Kids—Flint, Michigan's Cash Allowances for New Parents—Public Health On Call (September, 2023)
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Results from the Rx Kids Participant Survey & Maternal Wellbeing Research Study (pdf)
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Every new mom in this U.S. city is now getting cash aid for a year—NPR
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A New Kind of Disaster Aid: Pay People Cash, Before Disaster Strikes—NY Times
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Protecting the health of children with universal child cash benefits—ScienceDirect
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As federal aid shrinks, communities try new ways to tackle child poverty on their own—NPR
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Public Health On Call, a podcast from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, |
| 0:05.9 | where we bring evidence, experience, and perspective to make sense of today's leading health challenges. |
| 0:16.3 | If you have questions or ideas for us, please send an email to public health question at jh.h.edu. |
| 0:23.8 | That's public health question at jh.u.edu for future podcast episodes. |
| 0:31.7 | This is Lindsay Smith Rogers. |
| 0:33.9 | In this episode, an update on RX Kids, a program in Flint, Michigan that prescribes cash to expecting and new mothers. |
| 0:42.3 | Dr. Mona Hannah, a pediatrician and the Associate Dean for Public Health at Michigan State University College of Human Medicine, |
| 0:49.2 | and Dr. Miriam LeCare, Director of Research for Give Directly, tell me about the launch of the program and what they've seen happen in its first year, and why cash support may be one of the most important health interventions with global evidence of its success. |
| 1:04.9 | Just a note that this podcast episode was recorded in late October, and given the outcome of the presidential election, |
| 1:12.0 | it's now a more important bipartisan conversation than ever. Let's listen. |
| 1:17.4 | Dr. Mona Hannah and Dr. Miriam LaCare, thank you so much for joining us. Today, we're actually |
| 1:22.7 | going to start talking with you, Mona, because you've been on the podcast before. We did an episode about this program, |
| 1:29.2 | RX Kids, when it was first launching. And we're back to talk about some updates. But first of all, |
| 1:34.2 | can you can you help our listeners remind them what RX Kids is and what this program does? |
| 1:39.8 | Absolutely. It is great to be back on the podcast. Thank you for having us back on. |
| 1:44.3 | So Ars Kids is super exciting. I think it's the most exciting thing happening in public health right now. |
| 1:49.3 | And we call Arx Kids a prescription for health, hope, and opportunity. |
| 1:54.9 | Arx Kids is the nation's first citywide, universal, and unconditional maternal and infant cash prescription program. |
| 2:05.5 | So what that means is everybody in Flint, Michigan, every pregnant person receives |
| 2:11.0 | unconditional cash during mid-pregnancy, and every baby gets unconditional cash for that first |
| 2:16.4 | year of life. So AR our kids launched in Flint, |
| 2:18.8 | Michigan in January of 2024. And it's only spreading. And how much cash are we talking about? |
... |
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