Originally posted on The Boston Globe. For six months, direct payments to children changed the household math for many families. Now they’re over. Starting in July, Rebecca Wood’s tight family budget was buoyed by a federal payment that landed in her bank account on the 15th of each month — no strings attached. It was […]
Originally posted on The Conversation. The discontinuation of the Biden administration’s monthly payments of the child tax credit could leave millions of American families without enough food on the table, according to our new study in JAMA Network Open. The first missed payment on Jan. 15, 2022, left families that had come to rely on them […]
Originally posted on Boston University School of Public Health. January 15 will mark the first time in seven months that the families of more than 61 million children in the United States will not receive a monthly payment of the advance Child Tax Credit (CTC), after Congress failed to pass the Build Back Better Act, […]
Originally posted on United Press International. Jan. 13 (UPI) — Advance Child Tax Credit payments, part of last year’s federal American Rescue Plan, reduced food insufficiency, or lack of food, in households across the country by 26%, a study published Thursday by JAMA Network Open found. However, those gains are likely to be reversed because the federal relief […]
Originally posted on MedPage Today. — Should the expired Child Tax Credit policy be carried forward? The Child Tax Credit safeguarded U.S. families with children from food insufficiency during the pandemic and should be made permanent, researchers urged. Starting in July and August 2021, the first advance payments of the expanded Child Tax Credit corresponded […]
Originally posted on NPR. NPR’s Ailsa Chang speaks with pediatrician Dr. Megan Sandel about how the pandemic has exasperated child hunger in the country and could worsen as pandemic-relief programs run out.
Originally posted on CBC News. The Build Back Better bill passed by the House of Representatives offered paid parental leave for a country that lacks it, universal preschool, cheaper child care for 20 million children, lower costs for some drugs including insulin, savings for families using the Obamacare health system, and funding for one million […]
Originally posted on BMC HealthCity. One in five renters living with children are having difficulty keeping up on rent. Megan Sandel, MD, proposes a three-pronged solution. “One thing that the COVID-19 pandemic has really made clear is that it has increased housing stability from a crisis to now, really, a pandemic in and of itself,” […]
Originally posted on Bloomberg. Quicktake “Charge” clip with Children’s HealthWatch Co-Lead Principal Investigator, Dr. Megan Sandel. “We know that people are using the Child Tax Credit well." Watch Children’s HealthWatch Co-Lead Principal Investigator @megansandel on @business talk about why the #AdvancedCTC is so important! pic.twitter.com/mY8h9QhlDt — Children’s HealthWatch (@ChildrensHW) December 21, 2021
Originally posted on Bloomberg. Underfed children are falling behind the growth curve in some high-risk areas, while other families turn to cheaper, less-nutritious foods to fill up. Both will have lasting impacts. One-year-olds are falling further behind the growth curve at a Boston clinic that treats toddlers so underweight their brain development is at risk. […]