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The Fund identifies and shares policy ideas and analysis to advance state health leadership, strong primary care, and sustainable health care costs.
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The Fund publishes The Milbank Quarterly, as well as reports, issues briefs, and case studies on topics important to health policy leaders.
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Quarterly Department
Quarterly Article
February 2026 Anthony Iton, PRITPAL S. TAMBER, Gina Massuda Barnett, Rachel Rubin, Adam Kader, Christina R. Welter, Elizabeth Fisher, Jennifer Ybarra, Pamela Agustin-Anguiano, Greg Bonett, Jeanne Ayers, Meredith Minkler,
Disparities in health often arise due to unfair or unjust social arrangements making them inequities. More
February 2026 T. Joseph Mattingly II, Madeline O'Neal,
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act, enacted on July 4, 2025, established the first nationwide Medicaid work requirement, replacing prior state-specific Section 1115 demonstrations with a uniform federal standard More
February 2026 Robert L. Phillips, Rebecca Fisher, Claire Jackson, Danielle Martin, Tim Olde Hartman, Felicity Goodyear-Smith,
Primary care is the foundation of most health systems; yet across diverse countries, structures, policies, and payment models, it is under threat. More
February 2026 Jennifer L. Pomeranz, Erika Hanson, Dariush Mozaffarian,
The United States is an outlier worldwide in its permissive regulatory landscape for direct-to-consumer (DTC) prescription drug promotion. Recent proposals to restrict DTC prescription drug advertising raise questions about potential challenges under the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution which protects commercial speech. More
November 2025 ANDRE NOGUEIRA, MARGARET M. FITZPATRICK, ASHLEY GRESH, KENNEDY MCDANIEL, TIFFANY J. RISER, TERRANCE LINDSAY, RANDI WOODS, ADEDOYIN EISAPE, LISA STAMBOLIS, ALICIA COOKE, BRUCE LEFF, ELIANA PERRIN, REGINA HAMMOND, Sarah L. Szanton,
Despite spending more per capita on healthcare than any other nation, the United States experiences declining life expectancy and increasing chronic disease burden—a paradox reflecting fundamental limitations in the current treatment-centered, facility-based care system. This paper introduces Neighborhood Nursing, an innovative universal care infrastructure designed to shift the US healthcare toward proactive, prevention-centered care organized geographically in neighborhoods. More
September 2025 Pankaj Jain, Bhav Jain, Rushabh Doshi, Urvish Jain, Henry Claypool, Ariana Aboulafia, Bonnielin K. Swenor,
Throughout the last 50 years, the disability rights movement has made significant progress in providing statutory protections for people with disabilities in the United States. More
August 2025 LORI DORFMAN, Sarah E. Gollust, MAKANI THEMBA, PRITPAL S. TAMBER, Anthony Iton,
A growing body of scholarship and practice in public health attests to the importance of addressing differences in power as a fundamental determinant of health inequities. To pursue health equity, public health practitioners must move beyond identifying differences in health outcomes among populations (disparities) to articulating why those differences are unfair or unjust (inequities) and then identifying structures, such as laws, policies, practices, and norms, that advantage some and disadvantage others. More
August 2025 Philip M. Alberti,
For more than 2 years, I have started my speaking engagements with a simple message: “Health equity benefits all communities.” Although the message may be straightforward, health equity–focused scientists and advocates like me have done an inadequate and ineffective job making that point clear and believable through stories, data, and messaging. More
August 2025 Rick Mayes, Micah Johnson,
From 2004 to 2024, Medicare Advantage (MA) went from being a “policy disappointment,” covering 12% of all Medicare beneficiaries, to predominance, covering more than one-half (52%), with more growth predicted in the future. Drawing on an extensive review and synthesis of the literature, Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) reports, congressional committee hearings, and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) data, this paper analyzes the evolution of Medicare and managed care in three parts More
July 2025 Gabriela Plasencia, Kamaria Kaalund, Olurotimi Kukoyi, Viviana Martinez-Bianchi, Andrea Thoumi,
Populations that identify as Latino/a/e/x or Hispanic (herein referred to as Latine) in the United States continue to face disproportion-ate health and socioeconomic challenges that were exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic and persist in the current political climate. More