Bill Text: HI HR114 | 2020 | Regular Session | Introduced

Hawaii House Resolution 114 (Prior Session Legislation)

Introduced

Bill Title: Requesting The Governor To Invest In Preventative Health Care, Including Mental Health Wellness Intervention And Related Measures That Incorporate Native Hawaiian Cultural Practices, To Reduce The Exposure Of Children In The State To Adverse Childhood Experiences.

Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 9-0)

Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2020-03-11 - Referred to HLT/WLH, FIN, referral sheet 40 [HR114 Detail]

Download: Hawaii-2020-HR114-Introduced.html

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES	H.R. NO.	114
THIRTIETH LEGISLATURE, 2020
STATE OF HAWAII

HOUSE RESOLUTION

Requesting the Governor to invest in preventative health care, including MENTAL health wellness intervention and related measures that incorporate native hawaiian cultural practices, to reduce the exposure of children in the State to adverse childhood experiences.

WHEREAS, adverse childhood experiences are traumatic occurrences during childhood that can have a profound effect on a child's developing brain or body and can result in poor mental or physical health during the person's adulthood; and

WHEREAS, adverse childhood experiences can include: physical, emotional, or sexual abuse; physical and emotional neglect; and household dysfunction, including substance abuse, untreated mental illness or incarceration of a household member, domestic violence, or the separation or divorce of household members; and

WHEREAS, research published during the past two decades in the evolving fields of neuroscience, molecular biology, public health, genomics, and epigenetics demonstrate that the experiences of the first several years of life can change the biology of the human body in ways that can influence a person's physical, mental, and spiritual health over the course of that person's lifetime; and

WHEREAS, adverse childhood experiences impact the physical architecture of a child's developing brain and can have profound negative repercussions, as the brain serves as the foundation for all learning, health, and behavior; and

WHEREAS, strong, frequent, or prolonged stress in childhood caused by adverse childhood experiences can result in toxic stress that negatively impacts the development of a child's fundamental brain architecture and stress response system; and

WHEREAS, in 1998, the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in coordination with Kaiser Permanente, published an Adverse Childhood Experiences Study in which more than seventeen thousand adult Californians were surveyed regarding their personal childhood experiences; and

WHEREAS, the 1998 Adverse Childhood Experiences Study remains one of the largest investigations of the effects that childhood abuse, neglect, and household challenges have on later-life health and well-being; and

WHEREAS, two-thirds of participants in the 1998 Adverse Childhood Experiences Study had at least one adverse childhood experience and one in six participants had four or more adverse childhood experiences; and

WHEREAS, the 1998 Adverse Childhood Experiences Study also demonstrated a strong correlation between the number of adverse childhood experience and a person's risk for disease and negative health behaviors; and

WHEREAS, the 1998 Adverse Childhood Experiences Study included findings that:

(1) A person with four or more adverse childhood experiences is:

(A) 2.4 times more likely to have a stroke;

(B) 2.2 times more likely to have ischemic heart disease;

(D) 1.9 times more likely to have cancer;

(E) 1.7 times more likely to have diabetes;

(F) 12.2 times more likely to attempt suicide;

(G) 10.3 times more likely to use injection drugs;

(H) 7.4 times more likely to become an alcoholic; and

(I) 46 times more likely to have learning or emotional problems;

(2) A person with six or more adverse childhood experiences has a life expectancy that is twenty years shorter than that of a person with no adverse childhood experiences;

(3) A woman with seven or more adverse childhood experiences is 5.5 times more likely to become pregnant as a teenager;

(4) A woman with three or more violent adverse childhood experiences is 3.5 times more likely to become the victim of intimate partner violence; and

(5) A man with three or more violent adverse childhood experiences is 3.8 times more likely to perpetuate violence against an intimate partner; and

WHEREAS, adverse childhood experiences can affect a child's future contact with the criminal justice system; and

WHEREAS, the Trauma and Learning Policy Initiative, a nationally-recognized collaboration between Massachusetts Advocates for Children and Harvard Law School, finds that neurobiological, epigenetic, and physiological studies demonstrate that traumatic experiences in childhood and adolescence can diminish the concentration, memory, and organizational language abilities needed to succeed in school and can negatively impact the academic performance, classroom behavior, and ability to form relationships among children and adolescents; and

WHEREAS, early childhood education offers a unique window of opportunity to prevent and, if necessary, heal the impacts of adverse childhood experiences and toxic stress on a child's brain, body, and spirit; and

WHEREAS, the emerging science and research on toxic stress and adverse childhood experiences evince a growing public health crisis in the State, with impacts to the State's educational, juvenile justice, criminal justice, and public health systems; and

WHEREAS, positively influencing the architecture of a child's developing brain is more effective and less costly than attempting to correct poor learning, health, and behavior later in life; and

WHEREAS, supportive and stable relationships between children and their families, caregivers, and other important adults in their lives play a critical role in buffering children from the effects of toxic stress and adverse childhood experiences; and

WHEREAS, the influence of a stable and protective buffering relationship with a non-relative adult can also mitigate the negative effects of a child's adverse childhood experiences; and

WHEREAS, Native Hawaiian and other cultural practices provide a strength- and asset-based approach in building community wellness and resilience; and

WHEREAS, the State recognizes the significance of early childhood and youth brain development as well as the importance of considering the concepts of cultural and historical trauma, early adversity, toxic stress, childhood trauma, and protective buffering relationships when developing and establishing programming and services for children in the State; now, therefore,

BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the Thirtieth Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session of 2020, that the Governor is requested to invest in preventative health care, including mental health wellness intervention and related measures that incorporate Native Hawaiian cultural practices, to reduce the exposure of children in the State to adverse childhood experiences; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Legislature urges the Governor to consider the: principles of brain development; connection between mental, physical, and spiritual health; concepts of toxic stress, adverse childhood experiences, and buffering relationships; and the importance of early intervention and culture and aina-based programs when developing the policy strategies and goals of the State; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this Resolution be transmitted to the Governor, Chair of the Board of Education, Superintendent of Education, Director of Health, and Director of Human Services.