Wellness Programs Received Grant Funding! Unfortunately not for Participating Employers
Posted on July 26, 2011
Remember all of the hype regarding potential funding for employer-sponsored wellness programs, as outlined in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act? Well, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently announced that it has officially set aside $10 million to “establish and evaluate comprehensive workplace health promotion programs across the nation to improve the health of American workers and their families.” What has been an apparent misclarification, however, is that the $10 million has actually been set aside for the contractor that wins the grant to oversee the project, not (as assumed) divvied up by participating employers in the program.
The awarded contractor will select employers of all sizes to be involved in the study, and will be from each of 7 different regions across the nation. Participating employers will need to demonstrate full commitment to the program (particularly by the CEO) to allow employees to fully participate in wellness initiatives, the wellness program must be available at no cost to the employees, and the employer cannot currently have in place a workplace health program that consists of a majority of the interventions outlined in the study.
For more information about the initiative, and/or to read the extensive requirements necessary for soliciting vendors (who have an application due date of August 8, 2011), go here or visit www.fbo.gov.
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