Bill Declares Racism a Public Health Crisis, Creates CDC Centers for Anti-Racism and Police Violence Research

This proposed legislation, the "Anti-Racism in Public Health Act of 2025," takes a direct approach by officially labeling racism a public health crisis. It aims to establish two significant new programs within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC): a National Center on Antiracism and Health and a law enforcement violence prevention program. The core idea is to fund research, gather detailed data, and develop interventions to address health disparities linked to racism and the impacts of police interactions.

Decoding Health Gaps: The New Anti-Racism Hub

The first major piece is the creation of the National Center on Antiracism and Health (Sec. 3). Think of this as a dedicated hub within the CDC focused squarely on how structural racism affects people's health. Led by a director experienced in minority communities, its job description includes:

• Researching the Roots: Digging into how policies, biases, discrimination, and factors like "weathering" (the health impact of chronic stress from discrimination) contribute to health problems in communities of color.
• Funding Solutions: Awarding grants to researchers and organizations working on these issues, including setting up at least three regional centers of excellence.
• Building Knowledge: Creating interventions designed to dismantle racist systems and promote equity in health.
• Sharing Data: Establishing a public data clearinghouse, ensuring information is broken down by race, ethnicity, language, gender, socioeconomic status, and more, while following HIPAA privacy rules.
• Training & Collaboration: Developing training for health professionals and working with other CDC departments and Tribal nations to ensure antiracism is integrated into public health work.

Essentially, this center aims to build the evidence base and practical tools needed to treat racism as a concrete factor influencing health outcomes, moving beyond just acknowledging disparities to actively studying and trying to fix their systemic causes.

Under the Microscope: Policing's Public Health Footprint

The second key initiative (Sec. 4) establishes a law enforcement violence prevention program under the CDC's National Center for Injury Prevention and Control. This isn't about weighing in on policing tactics directly, but rather studying the public health consequences of police actions.

This program would:

• Study the Impacts: Research deaths, injuries, trauma, and mental health effects stemming from police presence and interactions, including use of force and brutality.
• Gather Stats: Work with state health departments and the Department of Justice to collect comprehensive, standardized data on law enforcement-related incidents and their health outcomes.
• Identify Risk Factors: Analyze legal, socioeconomic, and discrimination-related factors linked to police brutality.
• Develop Interventions: Create public health strategies aimed at preventing negative health outcomes from police interactions, potentially looking at alternatives to law enforcement responses.
• Report Findings: Provide annual reports to Congress with data, research findings, and recommendations.

This part of the bill treats police violence not just as a criminal justice issue, but as a public health problem with measurable effects on individuals and communities, aiming to use data and research to find ways to reduce harm.

Numbers Don't Lie: Data Collection Gets an Upgrade

A common thread through both sections is a heavy emphasis on data. The bill mandates detailed, disaggregated data collection on both racism's health impacts and police violence. This means tracking information not just overall, but broken down by specific demographics (race, ethnicity, language, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, socioeconomic status, disability). The goal is to get a much clearer picture of who is affected and how. Both new centers are tasked with making this data publicly available (while protecting individual privacy under HIPAA) and coordinating with other agencies to standardize how this information is gathered. Funding is authorized "as necessary," leaving the actual budget amounts to future decisions.