ATLANTA (Feb 15, 2024) – Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta Strong4Life is proud to announce that it is one of five collaborators funded by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) State Physical Activity and Nutrition (SPAN) grant program. SPAN focuses on promoting healthier lifestyles and addressing health disparities related to poor nutrition, physical inactivity and obesity.
“Children’s is honored to collaborate alongside Georgia Health Policy Center, Quality Care for Children, Wholesome Wave Georgia and the Georgia Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, to further our collective impact on child health,” says Marc Welsh, vice president of child advocacy and chief diversity officer at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta. “Over the past decade we have strengthened our community prevention model and increased our programs, trainings and resources to reach families with evidence-based nutrition and physical activity efforts to impact families and kids where they live, learn and play."
As part of this five-year grant, Strong4Life will collaborate with Wholesome Wave Georgia to lead the nutrition working group focused on expanding access to fruits and vegetables and promoting healthy food choices via nutrition guidelines in community settings. Strong4Life is well-positioned to strengthen these efforts due to the extensive network of community collaborators working to impact obesity in Georgia.
Strong4Life will support communities and collaborating partners with the following strategies:
- Assist early care and education settings in improving nutrition and physical activity and supporting breastfeeding.
- Make healthy food choices easier everywhere by promoting food service and nutrition guidelines and expanding fruit and vegetable voucher incentives and produce prescription programs.
- Provide safe and accessible physical activity by connecting pedestrian, bicycle or transit transportation networks to everyday destinations.
- Expand continuity of care in breastfeeding support by collaborating with partners to implement breastfeeding-friendly policies and practices.
“All kids deserve to experience the benefits of regular physical activity and healthy eating, but that’s only possible if we prioritize equal access to healthy opportunities and habits,” says Welsh. “This grant allows us to reach more counties across the state, so kids throughout Georgia can grow into safe, healthy and resilient adults.”
For more about the CDC SPAN grant, awarded to 17 other states, please visit: https://www.cdc.gov/nccdphp/dnpao/state-local-programs/span/span-2023.html.