When state and local policymakers work to promote health equity—the guiding principle that disparities in health outcomes caused by factors such as race, income, or geography should be addressed and prevented, providing opportunities for all people to be as healthy as possible—they often lack quality data on specific problems and affected populations. Restrictive or unclear policies for data sharing and privacy concerns can contribute to this lack of sufficient data. Other factors can include limited technical expertise, financial resources, and staff to integrate data across systems that often weren’t developed with such information sharing in mind.
The availability of complete and timely data equips policymakers to understand affected populations and direct resources, track progress, and promote accountability as they develop and implement solutions to reduce long-standing inequities. Officials also can ensure that equity concerns are considered in the data-gathering process by partnering with community members to make sure the information they have is relevant and accurate across demographic groups and at the neighborhood or community level. They also should work to provide context about the circumstances behind the data.
To help focus attention on these equity issues, the Health Impact Project, a collaboration of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and The Pew Charitable Trusts, launched Calling All Sectors: State Agencies Joined for Health in 2019. Nationwide, this initiative supports 10 cross-sector teams of community partners and state agencies in implementing strategies to identify and collect data from multiple sources. That data is used to align priorities, design improvements, address inequities, and measure progress. Here are three methods grantees are using to ensure that decision-makers have access to the data they need to boost health equity. (author abstract)