Current:Home > Contact-usProgram to provide cash for pregnant women in Flint, Michigan, and families with newborns-InfoLens
Program to provide cash for pregnant women in Flint, Michigan, and families with newborns
View Date:2024-12-23 12:40:51
FLINT, Mich. (AP) — A program aimed at helping remove families and infants in Flint, Michigan, from deep poverty will give $1,500 to women during mid-pregnancy and $500 each month throughout the first year after the birth.
Enrollment opened Wednesday for Rx Kids, lauded by officials as the first of its kind in the United States.
The program has no restrictions on income and empowers “parents with the freedom and choice to make the decisions that best fit their families’ needs,” officials said in a release.
The $1,500 can be used on food, prenatal care, rent, cribs or other needs. The $500 monthly stipend can be spent on formula, diapers or childcare.
Rx Kids is supported by a number of foundations, funds and the state of Michigan. More than $43 million of the program’s estimated $55 million cost over five years has been raised.
“Investing in strong families is an investment in Flint’s future,” Mayor Sheldon Neeley said. “Rx Kids will support mothers and children in Flint when they are most vulnerable. This blessing will lift families out of poverty and improve health outcomes. Our prayer is that we will improve maternal and infant health, and help Flint families raise strong, healthy babies.”
Flint has one of the highest childhood poverty rates in the nation. About a third of the city’s residents live in poverty, according to the Census.
“This first-in-the-nation initiative boldly reimagines how society supports families and children — how we care for each other,” said Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, a pediatrician and director of the Michigan State University-Hurley Children’s Hospital Pediatric Public Health Initiative.
Hanna-Attisha raised early alarms about lead-tainted drinking water in Flint after state-appointed city managers began using the Flint River in 2014 to save money while a new pipeline to Lake Huron was built. The water was not treated to reduce its corrosive qualities, causing lead to break off from old pipes and contaminate the system for more than a year.
A study by Hanna-Attisha found the percentage of Flint infants and children with above-average lead levels had nearly doubled citywide and almost tripled among children in “high risk” areas of lead exposure.
veryGood! (1)
Related
- Opinion: NFL began season with no Black offensive coordinators, first time since the 1980s
- Steward Health Care files a lawsuit against a US Senate panel over contempt resolution
- Cincinnati Opera postpones Afrofuturist-themed `Lalovavi’ by a year to the summer of 2026
- San Diego Padres back in MLB playoffs after 'selfishness' doomed last season's flop
- Man killed by police in Minnesota was being sought in death of his pregnant wife
- Biden plans survey of devastation in North Carolina as Helene’s death toll tops 130
- A port strike could cost the economy $5 billion per day, here's what it could mean for you
- Wisconsin city replaces ballot drop box after mayor carted it away
- The Stanley x LoveShackFancy Collaboration That Sold Out in Minutes Is Back for Part 2—Don’t Miss Out!
- Plans to build green spaces aimed at tackling heat, flooding and blight
Ranking
- 2 dead in explosion at Kentucky factory that also damaged surrounding neighborhood
- The stock market's as strong as it's ever been, but there's a catch
- Biden says Olympians represented ‘the very best of America’
- Conyers fire: Shelter-in-place still in effect after chemical fire at pool cleaning plant
- Mississippi woman pleads guilty to stealing Social Security funds
- Murder in a Small Town’s Rossif Sutherland and Kristin Kreuk Detail “Thrilling” New Series
- ‘SNL’ 50th season premiere gets more than 5M viewers, its best opener since 2020
- Why break should be 'opportunity week' for Jim Harbaugh's Chargers to improve passing game
Recommendation
-
The Surreal Life’s Kim Zolciak Fuels Dating Rumors With Costar Chet Hanks After Kroy Biermann Split
-
Justice Department will launch civil rights review into 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre
-
Katie Meyer's family 'extremely disappointed' Stanford didn't honor ex-goalie last week
-
Donald Trump suggests ‘one rough hour’ of policing will end theft
-
What is ‘Doge’? Explaining the meme and cryptocurrency after Elon Musk's appointment to D.O.G.E.
-
'I hate Las Vegas': Green Day canceled on at least 2 radio stations after trash talk
-
Judge in Alaska sets aside critical habitat designation for threatened bearded, ringed seals
-
Appeal delays $600 million class action settlement payments in fiery Ohio derailment