The Fund supports networks of state health policy decision makers to help identify, inspire, and inform policy leaders.
The Milbank Memorial Fund supports two state leadership programs for legislative and executive branch state government officials committed to improving population health.
The Fund identifies and shares policy ideas and analysis to advance state health leadership, strong primary care, and sustainable health care costs.
Keep up with news and updates from the Milbank Memorial Fund. And read the latest blogs from our thought leaders, including Fund President Christopher F. Koller.
The Fund publishes The Milbank Quarterly, as well as reports, issues briefs, and case studies on topics important to health policy leaders.
The Milbank Memorial Fund is is a foundation that works to improve population health and health equity.
September 2003 (Volume 81)
Quarterly Article
Peter D. Jacobson
Gail L. Zellman
C. Christine Fair
Nov 5, 2024
Oct 30, 2024
Oct 23, 2024
Back to The Milbank Quarterly
The policy debate over prenatal substance exposure (PSE) is highly contentious and polarized. This article presents a new approach, called the reciprocal obligations framework, which is designed to reconcile the state’s legitimate interest in birth outcomes with a pregnant woman’s personal liberties and privacy rights. According to this framework, both the state and the pregnant woman have reciprocal obligations to the fetus and to each other that shape the limits of the state’s intervention and the pregnant woman’s response. If a pregnant woman decides to carry her pregnancy to term, both she and the state are obligated to act in the fetus’s best interests. The framework shifts the debate away from the maternal-fetal conflict to the mutual obligations of the pregnant woman and the state.
Author(s): Peter D. Jacobson; Gail L. Zellman; C. Christine Fair
Read on Wiley Online Library
Read on JSTOR
Volume 81, Issue 3 (pages 475–497) DOI: 10.1111/1468-0009.t01-1-00064 Published in 2003
