U.S. Senators Bob Menendez, a senior member of the Senate Finance Committee that sets national health policy, and Cory Booker (both D-N.J.) today announced that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has awarded the New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services $10,476,077 for its Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) Program services to women during pregnancy and to parents with young children.
Through MIECHV, nurses, social workers, or other professionals visit at-risk families in their homes to evaluate their living situations and provide information on resources available to improve the health, educational, and economic opportunities for at-risk children. Resources include health care, early education, parenting skills, child abuse prevention, and nutrition education or assistance.
Sen. Menendez secured a provision in the American Rescue Plan that provided an additional $150 million for staffing and servicing for MIECHV programs across the country including $2,435,374 for New Jersey. The provision also includes expanded flexibility for program operators to use funding to purchase technology needed for virtual home visits, and emergency supplies such as formula, food, water, hand soap and sanitizer, diapers, and prepaid grocery cards.
Sen. Menendez is the Senate champion of the MIECHV program and led the charge for a five-year reauthorization in 2017 to ensure families across the nation continue to receive services from this important program. The Senator is actively working on reauthorizing this important program which is set to expire at the end of September. In New Jersey, all twenty-one counties are served by this program. In 2020, 5,387 New Jersey families and 9,788 New Jersey children benefited from MIECHV programs with nearly 62,000 home visits.