What is SHIP?
The Statewide Health Improvement Partnership (SHIP) invests in local solutions for better health. Minnesota is embracing SHIP as a community-wide approach to improving health, by building a foundation for all Minnesotans.
SHIP launched as part of Minnesota's Vision for a Better State of Health, the bipartisan health reform package enacted in 2008. SHIP makes it easier for Minnesotans to make healthy choices where we live, learn, work and play.
Thanks to SHIP, communities across Minnesota are creating good health for parents, kids and the whole community. SHIP strategies include:
- Working with schools to encourage "Safe Routes to School" programs, so that kids arrive to school focused and ready to learn, and "Farm to School" programs, so that kids get healthy Minnesota produce and learn where their food comes from, all while benefiting local farmers.
- Supporting employers in offering comprehensive workplace wellness programs, which have been estimated to return from $3 to $6 for every $1 spent.
- Working with communities to encourage biking and walking, including "Complete Streets" with sidewalks and crosswalks, all designed to make it easier for people of all ages to get the physical activity they need.
- Providing better access to healthy fruits and vegetables in corner stores in cities and convenience stores, and through more farmers markets, especially those accepting Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) so that more people can get the healthy food their families need.
- Increasing healthier eating and physical activity in childcare through successful, proven early childhood programs.
- Helping colleges and universities go tobacco-free and connecting students and staff to smoking cessation services, as well as helping apartment building owners to voluntarily adopt smoke-free policies.
- Working with health care providers to offer the services and referrals their patients need to eat healthier, get more physical activity, quit smoking and encourage breastfeeding for newborns.
Why do we need SHIP?
As a public health agency, the Minnesota Department of Health believes we must address the top three preventable causes of illness and death in the U.S.: tobacco use/exposure, physical inactivity and poor nutrition.
- These three factors have been estimated to cause 35 percent of all deaths in the U.S., or 800,000 deaths each year.
- Chronic diseases account for an estimated 75 percent of health care spending in the U.S.
- In Minnesota, nearly two-thirds of adults are overweight or obese. The percent of children who are overweight or obese is also rising.
- Less than a quarter of Minnesota adults eat at least five fruits and vegetables each day.
- Only slightly more than half of Minnesota adults get at least a moderate level of exercise.
- Seventeen percent of Minnesota adults are current smokers, and many others are subjected to secondhand smoke.
In order to make an impact, SHIP relies on current research and best practices as developed by the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and other leaders in health improvement.