What Do We Stand For?
One year ago, as we were just one month into the new administration, I wrote that “At a moment when so much has been described as ‘unprecedented,’ and so much of what we value is being attacked, we need to ask ourselves as individuals, organizations, and a field, what do we stand for? What values do we hold, and what will we do and say to defend them?” Today, the answers to these questions are needed more urgently than ever.
Medicaid and Community Violence: Pathways to Sustainable Care
American cities are witnessing historic declines in gun violence. In recent years, cities like Baltimore, Philadelphia, and Chicago have all seen precipitous drops in homicides, with some reaching multi-decade record lows (Washington Post 2025). While there are many causes of this decline, experts in the field point to community violence intervention as driving the trend.
Reimagining Rural Health and Well-being
To inform positive change, Grantmakers in Health (GIH) and the National Rural Health Association (NRHA) are partnering to reimagine a unified vision for health and well-being in rural America. The Georgia Health Policy Center (GHPC) was engaged to conduct a landscape analysis and facilitate listening sessions with rural health stakeholders at the local, state, and national levels.
GIH Health Policy Update Newsletter
An Exclusive Resource for Funding Partners
The Health Policy Update is a newsletter produced in collaboration with Leavitt Partnersi and Trust for America’s Health. Drawing on GIH’s policy priorities outlined in our policy agenda and our strategic objective of increasing our policy and advocacy presence, the Health Policy Update provides GIH Funding Partners with a range of federal health policy news.
Paid Leave and Job Protection for Parents, People Who Are Sick and People Who Have Sick Family Members
Lack of paid family caregiving and medical leave policy at the national level makes the United States a global outlier. In the absence of a national guarantee, more than a dozen states have passed and implemented necessary paid family and medical leave. WORLD Policy Analysis Center has developed a database and policy briefs that describe paid leave laws and policies.
Lori A. Cox and Kristy Klein Davis Join GIH Board of Directors
Grantmakers In Health (GIH) is pleased to announce the elections of Lori A. Cox, Vice President of Programs at The California Wellness Foundation, and Kristy Klein Davis, President of the Georgia Health Initiative, to its Board of Directors.
Healing for Our Healers: Funding Transformational Staff Wellness
The Healing Trust has prioritized support beyond the programmatic check since the early years of our grantmaking in 2003. While the “how” of the funding has changed over time, the “why” has consistently been to support the healing of nonprofit staff. This isn’t tangential to making strategic community-based investments, rather it is the foundation on which meaningful change can emerge. When funders invest in the well-being of the staff of partner organizations, it creates a culture where all people’s needs are prioritized and compassionately met. The nonprofit network thrives when its leaders are well-rested. When staff are well taken care of, the clients benefit by means of an energized supporter who shows up with creativity, patience, compassion, and joy.
Striving for Equity: Riding to Success with Mobile Health
The Leon Lowenstein Foundation (LLF) is a family foundation established in 1941 with a focus on health, education, and the environment. In 2019, LLF adopted a new focus area for our health grantmaking. Our goal was to develop a strategy that would enable us to make a meaningful contribution to health equity, particularly through enhanced access to primary and preventive health services in disadvantaged communities.
Centering Black Voices: Lessons from a Two-Year Pilot Program in the Kansas City Region
The REACH Healthcare Foundation’s mission is to advance health equity through coverage and care for underserved people. A regional foundation granting about $4.5 million annually, REACH recently celebrated its 20th anniversary. To mark this milestone, Board and staff leadership reflected on the foundation’s evolution from a highly politicized health care conversion foundation at its inception to a philanthropy striving to reshape its actions and practices to reflect a more reparative approach focused squarely on health equity.