#SaveCHIP: Call to action!

Wednesday, January 10, 2018:
National Day of Action to #SaveCHIP!

This week marks 100 days since Congress failed to extend full funding for the successful, bipartisan Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), which provides 9 million U.S. children and pregnant women with comprehensive and affordable health care coverage. Since CHIP funding expired on September 30, 2017, Congress has only managed to enact
temporary, inadequate funding patches, delivered at the last possible moment with no comprehensive relief or assurance to states. This has manufactured an emergency with real consequences for children, families and pregnant women, and for the states, which operate CHIP programs. In fact, states are already notifying families that they may not have a source of
health coverage for their children, should Congress fail to enact a long-term extension of CHIP
funding.

How you can help:

Join the nation's leading children's health, medical and advocacy organizations in a day of action on January 10th to help #SaveCHIP:

· Using this toolkit<https://downloads.aap.org/DOFA/CHIPtoolkitJanuary2018partners.pdf>, call your federal legislators at (877) 233-9025 and tell them to immediately fund CHIP for five years. Congress votes on January 19th to fund the federal government; long-term CHIP must be included when they do.

· Using this toolkit<https://downloads.aap.org/DOFA/CHIPtoolkitJanuary2018partners.pdf>, share messages on social media using #SaveCHIP. Access state data, key messages and other resources to share, or develop your own!

· Tell your colleagues, neighbors and friends to join you! The more advocates speak out about the importance of CHIP on the same day at the same time, the more members of Congress will listen.

What families and states need is stability, and what they've gotten instead from congressional inaction is uncertainty. Please join us in raising your voice as part of our day of action to #SaveCHIP! Together we can make a difference for children, families and pregnant women across the country.

Please also feel free to share widely with your networks!

Thank you for all that you do!



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Piper Largent BA
Director of Government Affairs
National Association of School Nurses
Silver Spring, MD
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