Public health system—Foundational public health services—Intent

(1) Protecting the public's health across the state is a fundamental responsibility of the state and is accomplished through the governmental public health system. This system is comprised of the state department of health, state board of health, local health jurisdictions, sovereign tribal nations, and Indian health programs. (2)(a) The legislature intends to define a limited statewide set of core public health services, called foundational public health services, which the governmental public health system is responsible for providing in a consistent and uniform way in every community in Washington. These services are comprised of foundational programs and cross-cutting capabilities. (b) These governmental public health services should be delivered in ways that maximize the efficiency and effectiveness of the overall system, make best use of the public health workforce and evolving technology, and address health equity. (c) Funding for the governmental public health system must be restructured to support foundational public health services. In restructuring, there must be efforts to both reinforce current governmental public health system capacity and implement service delivery models allowing for system stabilization and transformation.