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Introduced March 18, 2026 by Lauren Underwood · Last progress March 18, 2026
Provides a comprehensive federal package to reduce maternal deaths, severe maternal illness, and racial and geographic disparities in pregnancy outcomes by funding grants, research, workforce training, data systems, telehealth demonstrations, respectful maternity care initiatives, and targeted programs for veterans and incarcerated pregnant/postpartum people. It also lengthens WIC postpartum and breastfeeding coverage, creates a Medicaid/CHIP payment-model demonstration, expands maternal mental health and substance-use supports, and invests in climate- and emergency-focused maternal surveillance and protections. Establishes new federal task forces, reporting and evaluation requirements, and multiple competitive grant programs with specific funding authorizations (mostly FY2027–FY2031) to support community-based organizations, health systems, training programs, and research centers, while requiring data disaggregation, technical assistance, and public reporting to measure progress and support best practices.
The bill makes sizable, coordinated investments to measure, address, and reduce maternal mortality and disparities—expanding postpartum coverage, community supports, workforce capacity, telehealth, and research—but does so with significant new federal spending, increased administrative and privacy burdens, and many programs structured as limited pilots or state‑dependent grants that could produce uneven access unless funding, oversight, and implementation are sustained and scaled.
Pregnant and postpartum people nationwide will be counted more accurately — deaths up to one year after pregnancy (including suicide and overdose) are explicitly included and maternal mortality review committees will review a broader set of cases — improving understanding of causes and targeting of interventions.
Low-income pregnant and postpartum people and communities with high maternal risk will gain expanded social supports and local services — funded grants and programs address housing, transportation, nutrition (WIC extended to 24 months), breastfeeding support, behavioral health, and climate-related protections.
The bill makes substantial, coordinated investments in research, surveillance, and data (CDC, NIH/NICHD, National Academies, GAO, MMRC support) to identify causes of maternal mortality, track disparities, and evaluate programs — producing better evidence to guide policy and programs.
Taxpayers and federal budgets will face substantial new spending authorizations across many programs (grants, NIH/CDC/NICHD funding, VA, WIC expansion, community grants), increasing federal outlays and raising potential budget/offset trade-offs.
States, hospitals, clinics, community-based organizations, Tribes, and grant recipients will incur significant new administrative, reporting, and compliance burdens (detailed demographic disaggregation, annual reports, program evaluations, Task Force obligations), straining smaller organizations and under-resourced agencies.
Expanded data collection and public reporting (including disaggregated and cross‑system records) create privacy and re‑identification risks for patients (and staff) if deidentification and safeguards are inadequate.