The Orange County Board of Supervisors unanimously voted on May 23 to extend its agreement with the Children and Families Commission of Orange County—a group affiliated with the Orange County Health Agency—to provide healthcare to pregnant and parenting mothers and their children through June 2024.
Services cover pregnant and prenatal women and their children from infancy until they are two years old with in-home visits, and then further services are available until the child is five years old.
Mothers receive postpartum care and additional visits up to 12 weeks post-birth.
For the 2022–2023 fiscal year, 125 individuals were enrolled in the program, with over 1,400 in-home visits.
According to data from the Orange County Health Agency, the past three years of the program have decreased preterm births—where a baby is born before 37 weeks gestation.
The in-home visits allow those with a difficult pregnancy or lack of childcare to still receive medical support.
“I think doing in-home care and bridging that gap, especially when women are unable to leave the house due to their pregnancies or children at home without childcare, it is so critical to keep moms healthy,” Supervisor Katrina Foley said during the meeting. “If moms are healthy, all of us are healthy.”
Nurses, associated with various county health programs, will provide services, including those specializing in high-risk pregnancies and at-risk newborns.
The Families Commission of Orange County, also known as the “First Five Orange County” supports education, health, and child development for pre-natal to age five children.
Funds are raised for the commission through Proposition 10—the California Children and Families Act of 1998—which added a 50-cent sales tax to tobacco product sales in the state.
The supervisors originally contracted for three years of services—starting in July 2020 and ending on June 30, 2023—at a cost of around $5 million.
With the supervisors’ vote, the contract is now extended until June 30, 2024, and received an additional $1.5 million in funding.
