H.R. 9877

Health Equity and Accountability Act of 2026

Sponsor: Raul Ruiz

26 cosponsors
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I Data collection and reporting

II Culturally and linguistically appropriate health and health care

III Health workforce diversity

A Diversifying the health care workplace

B Substance Use Disorder Treatment and Behavioral and Mental Health Workforce

C ACCESS in Mental Health Act

D Developing the Community Health Workforce Act

IV Improving Health Care Access and Quality

A Reducing Barriers to Accessing Care

B Improvement of Coverage

C Expansion of Access

1 General Provisions

2 Rural

3 Indian Communities

4 Providers

5 Dental

D Advancing Health Equity Through Payment and Delivery Reform

E Health Empowerment Zones

F Equitable Health Care for All

G Investing in Equity

H Miscellaneous

I Territories Health Equity

1 Medicare

A Part A

B Part B

C Medicare Advantage (Part C)

D Part D

2 Miscellaneous

V Improving health outcomes for women, gender-diverse people, children, and families

A Underserved communities

B Pregnancy screening

C Pregnancy-Related care

D Federal agency coordination on maternal health

E Reproductive and Sexual Health

Sec. 5407. Additional focus area for the Office on Women’s Health

Section 229(b) of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 237a(b)), as amended by section 5301(b), is further amended by adding at the end the following:

Text this section adds to the law

(10) facilitate the understanding of policymakers, health system leaders and providers, consumers, and other stakeholders concerning optimal maternity care and support for the provision of such care, including the priorities of—

(A) protecting, promoting, and supporting the innate capacities of childbearing individuals and their newborns for childbirth, breastfeeding, and attachment;

(B) using obstetric interventions only when such interventions are supported by strong, high-quality evidence, and minimizing overuse of maternity practices that have been shown to have benefit in limited situations and that can expose people, infants, or both to risk of harm if used routinely and indiscriminately, including overuse of continuous electronic fetal monitoring, labor induction, epidural analgesia, primary cesarean section, and routine repeat cesarean birth;

(C) reliably incorporating noninvasive, evidence-based practices that have a documented correlation with considerable improvement in outcomes with no detrimental side effects, such as incorporation of smoking cessation programs in pregnancy, maternal immunizations, and proven models (including group prenatal care, midwifery care, and doula support) that integrate health assessment, education, and support into a unified program, and supporting evidence-based breastfeeding promotion efforts with respect for a breastfeeding individual’s personal decisionmaking;

(D) a shared understanding of the qualifications of licensed providers of maternity care and the best evidence about the safety, satisfaction, outcomes, and costs of maternity care, and appropriate deployment of such caregivers within the maternity care workforce to address the needs of childbearing individuals and newborns and the growing shortage of maternity caregivers;

(E) a shared understanding of the results of the best available research comparing hospital, birth center, and planned home births, including information about each setting’s safety, satisfaction, outcomes, and costs;

(F) a shared understanding of the importance for the safety and choices of birthing families of an integrated maternity care system with seamless processes for consultation, shared care, transfer and transport across maternity care settings, and use of providers when birthing people and their newborns require a higher level of care;

(G) advancing high-quality, evidence-based childbirth education that—

(i) promotes a healthy and safe approach to pregnancy, childbirth, and early parenting;

(ii) is taught by certified educators, peer counselors, and health professionals; and

(iii) promotes informed decisionmaking by childbearing individuals; and

(H) developing measures that enable a more robust, balanced set of standardized maternity care measures, including performance and quality measures.

F Children’s Health

G Elder Care

H Miscellaneous provisions

VI Mental health and substance use disorders

A Access to care and funding streams

B Interprofessional care

C Workforce development

D Children’s mental health

E Community-Based care

F Reports

G Miscellaneous provisions

VII Addressing high-impact minority diseases

A Cancer

B Viral hepatitis and liver cancer control and prevention

C Acquired bone marrow failure diseases

D Cardiovascular disease, chronic disease, obesity, and other disease issues

E HIV/AIDS

F Diabetes

G Lung disease

H Tuberculosis

I Osteoarthritis and Musculoskeletal Diseases

J Sleep and circadian rhythm disorders

K Kidney disease research, surveillance, prevention, and treatment

L Diversity in clinical trials

M Additional provisions addressing high-impact minority diseases

N Health Equity and Rare Disease Act

O Asunción Valdivia Heat Illness, Injury, and Fatality Prevention

P New Era of Preventing End-Stage Kidney Disease

VIII Health Information Technology

A Reducing Health Disparities Through Health IT

B Modifications To Achieve Parity in Existing Programs

C Additional Research and Studies

D Closing Gaps in Funding To Adopt Certified EHRs

E Expanding Access to Telehealth Services

IX Accountability and Evaluation

X Addressing Social Determinants and Improving Environmental Justice

A In General

B Gun Violence

C Nutrition for women, children, families

1 Senior hunger prevention

2 Closing the meal gap

D Universal school meals

1 School breakfast program

2 School lunch program

3 Elementary and secondary education data

4 Amendments to other programs and laws

XI Protections to combat regulatory harm to health equity