Sponsors (67)
The bill channels modestly increased funding to targeted maternal and postpartum vaccine outreach (boosting uptake and equity, especially for racial/ethnic minorities and provider counseling) in exchange for a small annual taxpayer cost and potential trade-offs in CDC priorities and administrative burden for providers and health systems.
Pregnant and postpartum people — especially racial and ethnic minorities — and their obstetric providers will receive targeted vaccine outreach, education, and clinician communications, which is likely to increase maternal and infant vaccination rates and reduce racial/ethnic disparities.
State and local public health programs and hospitals will get increased annual program funding (raising the authorization from $5M to $7M for FY2027–2031), providing more resources for outreach and implementation.
Taxpayers will pay roughly an additional $2 million per year (FY2027–2031) compared with the prior statutory funding level.
Prioritizing pregnant and postpartum populations for outreach could divert CDC attention and limited resources away from other vaccine communication priorities and populations.
Hospitals, obstetric providers, and state health systems may incur modest administrative burdens to implement the targeted communications, tracking, and outreach activities.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Expands federal vaccine outreach to obstetric providers, authorizes targeted activities for pregnant/postpartum people (including minority groups), and raises annual funding to $7M for FY2027–FY2031.
Official title: To amend the Public Health Service Act with respect to maternal vaccination awareness and equity, and for other purposes.
Introduced March 27, 2026 by Terri Sewell · Last progress March 27, 2026
Expands federal vaccine outreach to focus on pregnant and postpartum people by explicitly adding obstetric providers to targeted communications, authorizing activities to increase vaccination among pregnant/postpartum individuals (including racial and ethnic minority groups) and their children, and raising the statute's annual funding level for those outreach activities. It updates two provisions of the Public Health Service Act to broaden audience, clarify authorized activities addressing health equity, and increase funding in later fiscal years.