Stillbirth Prevention Legislative Efforts and Initiatives

Federal Stillbirth Prevention Legislation for 2023

The Maternal and Child Health Stillbirth Prevention Act and the SHINE for Autumn Act bills were reintroduced in the 118th Congress for 2023.  Both pieces of legislation are important to beginning the systemic change that our country needs to improve the unacceptable stillbirth rates. Click the links below to learn more and get involved with these legislative efforts. Contact your lawmakers about these two critical bills today!

SHINE Act

The Stillbirth Health Improvement and Education (SHINE) Act outlines a plan and funding for preventable stillbirth:

  • Provide funding to NIH and CDC for standardized stillbirth data collection and analysis

  • Develop and distribute educational materials for the purpose of stillbirth prevention

  • Create a perinatal pathology fellowship so there are more trained pathologists to help families determine causes of stillbirth

  • Request timely reporting of information to the U.S. Surgeon General and Department of Health and Human Services

Maternal and Child Health Stillbirth Prevention Act

The Maternal and Child Health Stillbirth Prevention Act would add stillbirth and stillbirth prevention to Title V of the Social Security Act, something that has been lacking since the introduction of Title V funding in 1935. This legislation would mandate that state health department funding that they are already receiving from the federal government must also be used to address stillbirth. There is no additional funding attached to this piece of legislation. Currently, a majority of state health departments across the country do not fund stillbirth prevention programs (such as Count the Kicks).

NICHD

In December 2022, The MTP Team submitted a response to the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Stillbirth Team’s Request for Information (RFI): Developing Strategies to Strengthen Research on Stillbirth Prevention. View our response. Our hope is that the NICHD encourages Congress to allocate funding for EPV research and improved data collection and reporting. Watch members of our team speak at the NICHD listening session January 5, 2023. (MTP team members spoke at 1:41:30 and 2:12:10.) The NICHD’s Stillbirth Task Force’s report on its work was released in March 2023: Working to Address the Tragedy of Stillbirth (pdf).