>> 2 Kentucky health groups are joining forces to inform pregnant women about the risks of COVID-19 and the benefits of the vaccine.

Then 10 more president and CEO of the Foundation for a healthy Kentucky joins me to discuss this new initiative and more that's now on connections.

Thank you for joining us today for connections.

I'm Renee Shaw, the Centers for Disease Control report that currently less than one-third of expectant mothers in the U.S. are vaccinated against COVID-19, the foundation for a healthy Kentucky and the Kentucky Association of Health Plans just launched an initiative in public service campaign that encourages women to just talk with their OBGYN about the matter.

Then Chandler, president and CEO of the Foundation for a healthy Kentucky joins me to discuss this and other work and policies of the foundation.

Thank you so Year to be always good to be with It's always a pleasure because you, you know so much as as a congressman as attorney general, you know, so, you know, the state, you know, the nation that, you know, all of this.

but wise wise, right?

And now you're publishing the Woodford sign.

I don't know how you do it all.

Well, a lot to do.

Yeah.

That and expect to be doing as much as I was doing that I would be able to be to retire.

>> Yeah, you're supposed to be on a golf course somewhere.

But, you know, other plans, you know, I still got work to do.

It's a lot of fun, though.

It's inch well and what you're doing with the foundation for a healthy Kentucky.

Really, it is the the preeminent health organization, public policy, health organization in the state.

You all tackle issues large and small in some contentious and controversial.

>> Well, we do.

And we have a mission that I think is a very important mission.

And that is just very simply to improve the health of all of our people from one end of the state to the other.

We want people to live is healthy life as they can live and as you know, the numbers in Kentucky are not good.

Yeah.

There are a lot of people who are not living healthy lives.

So for for a variety of reasons.

But we've got our work cut out for us.

The foundation is is non-partisan and we want to we want to make common cause with anybody who wants better health.

Right.

And it's just there anything more important than that out.

That's not it.

>> You know, was it bring UK?

President Lee Todd talked about the Kentucky a glaze and a lot of those metrics and indicators were health based, right?

Our wellbeing.

I mean, you know, in the top for heart disease and and child welfare issues.

We weren't getting right.

I mean, you name it.

Opioid and substance abuse the nation in cancer, right?

You know, has things like that of all the things.

Can you imagine wanting your home state?

>> The number one cancer.

Yeah.

And as you said, child welfare we we have had we lead the nation in the maltreatment of children for the last 3 years.

At least my it just there are things that you don't want to see happen and their statistics.

But behind those statistics, a real people, real Kentucky INS who are hurting your right.

You all do some great work in polling and sitting out the service about what Kentuckians think again and even about how we rank and who is suffering.

>> And it is it for the media to get caught up in the numbers and percentages.

But as you say, we know we need to humanize it to show.

These are the people, the stories, the lives that are really affected.

A lot of people, a lot of people suffering a lot of Kentuckians dying earlier than they need to.

Yeah.

And that's just not.

That.

That's not the way it ought to be right.

And lifestyle choices can make a big difference.

And that kind of leads in sideways into this topic at hand.

Well, it's a big part of life.

Lifestyle choices are a huge part of it.

And I think that >> our health care system, it's not just a win in Kentucky.

It's the one in the entire country.

We have the centrally developed and evolved over overtime to what it amounts to rescue system.

And don't we don't focus on wellness nearly as much as we ought to.

And it's a shame.

>> Yeah, a sick care system is what we often hear right instead of a health care.

Yeah.

Well, we have to have a big, long conversation about integrated care, mental illness, of course, has risen to the top of concerns and then and now we're actually connecting our neck up to the rest of our body, which we haven't done for a long time.

And I know the foundation is glad to see some positive movement, an acknowledgement of mental health issues as an illness and has a disease.

Absolutely.

You know the and they get criticized a lot, but they've done some in the last session.

They actually did some good things in these areas.

>> They did some good things in mental health.

That's right.

And moved that ball forward.

What they did with community health workers.

I think he's been a very big positive.

The community health workers are are a group of people that I think are important too wellness is is any other group the back and and they're the people essentially who help navigate people through this byzantine health care system that we have the the the most sophisticated people that you can imagine have trouble through it.

Yeah.

And people who are not used to it, not familiar with it.

Of course they're going to have trouble.

That's right.

Yeah.

And they need help.

And now the General Assembly, I think, is going to help that is going to make sure more that help comes to beat you and want to talk about that more to let's talk about COVID and pregnancy.

>> And this initiative that you are joining with the Kentucky Association of Health plans to make sure that women just have the conversation and 31%.

>> A pregnant women.

That's the number of pregnant women in this country that actually have received the vaccine.

That is a scary low number.

It really is.

And what it means is that you've got an enormous number of pregnant women here in Kentucky for sure her vulnerable are particularly vulnerable.

We've got all the data that you need to show that you're much more vulnerable.

You're much more vulnerable to death if you don't get vaccinated, you're much more vulnerable to having a premature baby.

If you're not vaccinated.

And the list goes on anything that you can think of that would be a health own ability if you don't get the vaccine, you're much, much more vulnerable than if you do get the vaccine.

Now what we're trying to do, what we understand is the messengers import and people don't trust the government.

They they don't trust institutions.

They tend to not trust the media.

That's right.

That's right.

who do they trust?

And we have put focus groups together and we have discovered that they still have some faith in their own So we're not even trying to tell them.

That they should get the vaccine, even though we know they should.

We're telling them go have a conversation with your physician.

Sit down.

Talk with your doctor and talk about what's best for I think the result will be that they will have more confidence.

They will have more understanding of why it's important.

They will also understand that the vaccine will not hurt their The baby's not getting the vaccine.

Maybe it's just getting antibodies from from its mother right?

And the baby will be protected.

Fertility rates do not go down as a result.

That's a big concern.

>> They were you hear that a lot.

How bearing women and you hear that a lot.

And it's just there's no data.

>> To suggest that fertility rates go down with the vaccine.

Right?

So the what we're trying to do just very simply is convince women.

To talk to their own physician.

>> And in many would say we aren't providers already initiating that conversation was patients not as much as they should.

The numbers show.

And again, in these focus groups with women >> we come out with data that suggests that those conversations are not taking place like they ought to.

Now why that is, I'm not entirely sure.

But you know it it.

It may be they think it's too controversial.

I know.

But but these are conversations that need to happen.

And if they do happen, I think we will see.

Pregnant women and their babies.

be healthier?

Yeah, absolutely.

When you talk about the messenger, do you think that?

>> If more doctors had come out and not just the science and scientists in the epidemiologist, but just your family care physicians, folks for women there, ObGyn is their primary care physician if they would come out and said, here's what we recommend based on the science and our medical expertise.

Well, I think so.

And and of course, there.

>> Their umbrella groups like the Kma why they have come out and clear about it.

But I think doctors that, you know, the way they've always operated as they waited for patients to present to all that it's just not been the way the system has been set up for doctors to reach app and doctors wait for somebody to come see them and then they help as best they can.

And I think it takes them into an area that they really haven't been in very much reaching out and reaching out on a large scale.

I would like to to encourage that more.

I'd love to see more doctors to do that.

And I would love to see us give them more opportunities I'm quite certain that they're almost unanimous on the subject to the vaccine, that it's much better to get the vaccine than to get the disease, right?

Yeah.

>> And that, you know, and and there is some bipartisan consensus about that, right?

I mean, we've heard members of our federal delegation and and our state legislature who are been proponents for that without trying to push it.

But there may have been other contrary legislation that may have been dry, but at least you know, they tried to encourage vaccinations.

They have it.

You got enough voices on the other side of that enough, miss misinformation to confuse the situation, unfortunately.

And that's, of course, what we're dealing with.

>> But but, yes, it's nice to see that there have been people, both Democrats and Republicans who have said you ought to get the vaccine.

Senator McConnell is a good example.

He has been clear about this and he cites his own history with polio.

That's right.

And he says, you know, vaccines are good.

They've they've saved countless numbers of people in our society over decades.

And so you've got you've got leaders like that who have been very clear on the Republican side.

Now, you, of course, you've got some others who muddy the water.

And I think it's a shame.

>> Do you with from the foundation's perspective, it's time to have a conversation more broadly about the efficacy of vaccines.

To your point, you know what I mean.

I didn't think anything about it or not gone overseas and are rolled up my sleeves and they've given me a series of 15 shots.

But if I wanted to go to Indonesia, that's what I did.

But there's there seems to be and many people who have balked against the COVID vaccine have willingly take another vaccines, right?

Does there need to be an overall all discussion about the efficacy and safety we actually had our annual event about this past year about vaccines in general and not just the COVID vaccine.

>> And I do think that the more that we talk about this, the better with off, we'll be because one of the things that really worries me and you've seen some indication of it is that where people head?

Before the pandemic had just normally gone to get a vaccine and that thought anything of it.

They're now thinking having second thoughts about getting their regular vaccines.

And we're seeing a a lower rate of of vaccines in young children, for instance, and vaccines that they need like the polio vaccine.

I write those kinds of things and what we're going to find is those diseases I'm afraid are going to come roaring back.

If we don't protect the society is oh, yeah.

>> Speaking of the General Assembly that the session that just ended in April of 2022.

From your perspective, when the health policy arena, what stands out to you was Gray day.

They got that right?

Well, I >> I think as I said earlier on the community health centers, I think that was a big deal.

I think that they really did do a good job on that.

I think they made some gains on mental though.

Those those are 2 that really, really stand that were not taken up smoking.

>> Well, no, there are a lot of things we'd like to talk about.

And smoking courses is one thing that the foundation's always been interested in.

But any health care provider will tell you that the use of tobacco is the single.

Most preventable thing that if you can curtail the use of tobacco, you can prevent more unnecessary diseases, then anything any other one thing that you can do now, lung cancer?

You know, we lead the nation in lung cancer and we lead by wide margins.

And that's because our smoking rate is as high as it is.

The General Assembly did something good.

I think it's an a on that, too, because they in this last session they increased.

They moved toward so increasing the the ability for people to get scans or lease game right.

And to be able to to see whether they have cancer at an early day and they think that they can cut the rate of death mortality from lung cancer by as much as 20%.

Wow, if people and you know that he that if people just get screened, it screened early.

Yeah.

>> Screenings just in general that I mean from everything, especially when we were talking before we started rolling tape about when you get older, you you just go to the doctor more and more doctors and nobody wants to go and nobody wants to.

And you know, but it's so important to get screened.

And as you say, for all these things.

But, you know, I'm just like everybody else.

I don't want people.

Doctor poking and prodding.

I mean, I'm afraid maybe they'll find some.

That's right.

You know, that maybe would have been.

Okay.

Haha, you you you have those that.

All right.

Yeah.

But the truth is that that if you catch things whatever it may be, if you can catch it early, your chances of surviving it and having a better outcome go up exponentially.

So it's just absolutely critical that you try to to get screened and go to your doctor regularly if you can.

Yeah.

Substance abuse foundations been really engaged and opioid addiction and dealing with the abatement of the substance use disorder.

>> I mean, that just seems like an upward climb.

You know, of course, the pandemic didn't help.

And we know that those numbers did take an uptick and it would be interesting to see what happens and a couple years from now, if that recedes and all are.

>> Well, I'll tell you what, one of our focus areas is adverse childhood.

>> Yes, yes.

And >> the maltreatment of children in Kentucky has been badly exacerbated by substance use disorder, bad bad in the opioid You know, parents dying from drug use or or being, you know, using it to the extent that they no longer fit parents.

All right.

So the kids have to be placed elsewhere.

Bay, that straw man.

That's right.

It's traumatic to deal with any aspect of that thing.

So we're not just talking about the people who are using the substances.

We're talking about their friends and family to.

We're talking about all of the other people are impacted and in many cases impacted in a major very detrimental way.

And we're going to be paying for this epidemic for generations.

Time for Yeah, it really is going to cost us a lot.

And and we try our best to to do something about it.

But really it's embedded in the social determinants of health.

If you want to really get up to the true cause of it.

And we spend, I'd say 90 plus percent of our money on the subject.

Trying to rescue people from it right now.

I am not against that.

I think obviously you need to have re had the need to try to help people anyway.

You can.

But rehabbing people who already have the addiction doesn't get too.

Yeah.

The primary cause of the problem they started in the first to get at whether that's poverty or whatever.

>> He's a big one.

Yeah, absolutely.

And thinking about the number of grandparents raising their grandkids because their children are not in a and they may not even be alive or they're not.

As you put it sit because of their substance use disorder to raise those kids.

I mean, at the ramifications for this on our educational and social services systems, criminal justice system.

It's extraordinary.

It really is.

And and and people, you know, they're lucky to have grandparents.

Yeah, I can do that if they don't.

And if the grandparents are unable to step in or some other relative >> you you're talking about put them in foster and the foster care system.

We want to strengthen it and make it is as good as we can make it.

But under the best of circumstances, that's not easy.

Him.

As you know.

Now.

>> One of the big topics and I dare get into this with We often hear about during the session medical marijuana top.

Well, and and and you all have done surveys about the where people stand on the legalization of medical marijuana in Kentucky and there seems to be of a majority of people polled.

Yeah, I think the heavy images have.

Yeah.

I think people do want it.

>> you know, they're just like everything else.

And we talked about this before.

We went on air.

Nothing is black and white, right?

It's there are.

Pros and cons to this.

I have a tendency in and have for some time to liken the subject of marijuana.

Use that to alcohol and what happened.

And when I say that what I mean is what happened historically with alcohol to the VOLSTEAD Act back in the 1920's when they actually made they prohibited right alcohol.

They illegal and it was unacceptable.

The society would not stand for it and they had to repeal it.

In other words, that they were unable to police it to such an extent that it was a law that that really made sense for the country right?

Same thing I think really may very well be true here.

We have fought against marijuana and in a war on drugs for decades and decades.

And guess what?

We've lost, you I don't think anybody can say that law enforcement has been successful and its efforts to eradicate marijuana and then quit the use of that drug.

So.

What I think a lot of people I believe is that we ought to figure out how to deal with it within that context is that that's the practical way to deal with it.

You have to you maybe should legalize it.

You may be should then taxes.

You maybe should put things in place.

Laws in place too, to make sure that it is not to be used make sure that people who may have a problem with it are treated properly in those kinds of things.

>> Taxing medical marijuana, even though.

Well, I know that you you we don't tax medicines, right track text message.

>> Well, and I'm really talking about Hank Lee.

I think.

>> To some extent, the medical marijuana is a lead into legalizing it.

And that's what opponents say will out think that's frankly, I think it's I just think it's not.

And if we think about just the conversation we had that preceded this one about the substance use disorder rate in Kentucky, many people say we're just going SAS debate that if you legalize.

>> Marijuana for medicinal use or recreational or both.

>> There are a lot of people who think that and and they have a point.

But but the problem that you've got this practical problem and that is.

We're not stopping.

>> And, you winds still happening whether or not to legalize it or not.

A lot of what everyday exactly is still happening.

So you can continue to pretend like you're making something illegal and that it than that by making it a legal that will stop it.

But it didn't stopping right.

So you've got a practical problem on your hands.

>> You've got to decide how you're going to deal with that.

I mean, we've got other concerns about it.

Most of it I think, is ingested through and we're not really in favor of people smoking thing right?

>> What it is, you're not for that.

If you take anything in the airlines other than oxygen is probably bad idea.

So it's not terribly good for you.

Yeah.

So there's just a lot of negatives associated with it.

But we still have a practical problem on our hands.

Now, the medical thing is a whole nother thing, too.

The doctors don't want to prescribe.

You can talk to the talk to the doctors and they'll tell you.

We don't want to be the ones that everybody comes to and says, well, I want some and, you know, when the dosage how much are you prescribing how the dosage is a problem?

>> Especially when it comes to paying what what is at the 5th vital sign like that's somewhat subjective.

Nobody knows how to deal with paying right now.

Right?

Yeah.

It with the tools we have now and marijuana.

I think also comes in many different.

Shapes and sizes.

You know, I mean, and the error you going to when you when when you prescribe it.

What are you prescribing real?

So they're in doctor, see that.

And they don't want to be.

They don't want to hold the bag on that.

So that's a problem right?

On the other hand, anecdotally, you hear from lots and lots of people that really does make a difference, particularly with It makes a tremendous with seizures and that sort of thing.

It really makes a difference.

And >> ucsd a lot.

Yes, PTSD.

So you don't.

You certainly don't want to prohibit.

>> People who be helped.

But right, right.

So >> it's just a it's just a tough issue and they're wrestling with it.

But I will say this.

Unfortunately, a lot of these things, Kentucky's always how many other states now?

>> Thirtysomething 33 or something.

36.

Yeah.

I it's almost it's got to the point where not only of a majority.

>> Of states already passed it.

But in the Super majority, yeah, you know, we're in a small minority now.

States that haven't.

And I can tell you that's untenable to yeah, you know, we're we're not going to be able to write to withstand all all I mean, if you can get it legally elsewhere, you bring in Kentucky.

Are you then going to be charged?

I don't think anybody is really going to charge anybody.

So again, it's a practical problem, right?

>> And we talk about not overcrowding over flooding our jails that are already overcrowded over flooded in, you know, and not even having the decriminalization conversation.

But a lot of cops like I'm not going to but in jail over some pie.

And if they do, you've got other societal issues that come into play here.

You put in jail will usually it's minorities.

It's a >> people who are less well educated.

It's people who don't have very much money to be able to to fight the system.

So, you know, you've got an unfairness there, too.

>> You a big lexicon, social determinants of health and health equity and health disparities been another kind of I think, cornerstone of the work of the foundation for a healthy Kentucky and even corporate it in all of these issues that we've talked about.

>> Health equity in particular is a very big issue for us.

And what we know we're trying to improve the health of our state of the people who live in our state.

We're not going to get anywhere with that unless we deal with the people who have.

The most severe problems and those tend to be people who are on the wrong side of the equity issues that they tend to be minority groups.

They tend to quite frankly.

You see a lot of numbers, a lot of people in the mountains who suffer from poverty suffer from a lack of of equity as well.

They don't have the same access that a good foods.

They don't have the same access to The air quality is poor air quality is poor where they live their generally is not conducive to better help.

They don't have opportunities to to exercise of a readily available to them.

They're just a whole lot of which their disadvantage.

And we've got to and you see it in the numbers.

You see it.

You see that these people are less healthy and they live less law that they they don't live nearly as like they care that they're probably requiring is more is quite a bit more expensive.

>> And that's the thing that you can't get policymakers to understand is that if you deal with some of these things on the front and >> you will ultimately save a great deal of money on the back in.

We are paying so much money.

Trying to rescue people.

We're paying so much money in when people present with a chronic condition.

Or or in a key condition.

It costs more money to try to fix that, then it does to keep them well over time and prevent those chronic and acute conditions.

>> Well, we're grateful that the foundation for the Kentucky is trying to be on the preventive side of things and addressed the rescue portion plant health is very different from health care.

That's right.

Very different.

Yeah.

Thank you.

That's a good distinction to be made.

Ben Chandler, it's always a pleasure.

We can talk about all kinds of things because this guy's pretty smart guy knows a lot about the state and the nation.

As far as how it works in policy, we're glad to have him.

Thank you for watching connections.

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