ACP advocates for you on policy changes that will make a difference in your daily work, your professional development, and your patients’ health. We work across the aisle using our evidence-based policy papers, grassroots activities, work with congressional leaders, key agencies, regulators, and through collaborations with other organizations.
ACP’s advocacy priorities seek to promote policy reforms on the federal level through legislative, regulatory, and executive actions that benefit the overall health and well-being of patients, physicians, and the practice of internal medicine.
Communicating ACP Priorities to the New Administration and Congress
With a new presidential administration taking office and a new Congress being sworn in at the beginning of the year, ACP has been working to inform officials about the issues impacting internal medicine physicians and your patients. ACP shared its priorities with the presidential transition team, ahead of President Trump being sworn into office, with the new congressional leadership, and with the new leadership at the Department of Health and Human Services.
As the new administration has started to take shape, ACP has continued to press policymakers to protect the health and well-being of our country through comments on executive orders impacting health care, decrying missing information and missed meetings, and calling for protecting federal funding and staffing.
Advocating for credible, evidence-based information about vaccines
ACP has been particularly concerned with the spread of misinformation around vaccines and has been active in our advocacy and communications. Recent activities include:
- ACP issued strong statements on the dismissal of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) committee members and the subsequent committee selection process.
- ACP led an emergency resolution of the AMA, calling on the HHS Secretary to reverse his decision to dismiss the ACIP Committee members, and called for a Senate investigation into his actions.
- In an Ideas and Opinions in Annals of Internal Medicine, Drs. Darilyn V. Moyer, and ACP President Dr. Jason Goldman detail lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic and the importance of making vaccination recommendations based on scientific evidence and consideration of individual patients’ situations.
- In a commentary published in Annals of Internal Medicine, Drs. Christine Laine and Amir Qaseem sound the alarm over the threat of continued vaccine misinformation and declining immunization rates. The editorial is accompanied by the 2025 CDC immunization schedules.
- ACP helped lead a coalition with 34 scientific and medical organizations and issued a unified statement emphasizing the vital role of vaccinations in protecting public health in response to concerns over vaccine misinformation, declining trust in science, and the resurgence of preventable infectious diseases.
- ACP issued a statement objecting to the Department of Health and Human Services’ (HHS) announcement that COVID-19 vaccines will no longer be recommended for healthy pregnant individuals and children.
- ACP issued a joint statement expressing serious concern and strong opposition to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) decision to terminate grants studying vaccine hesitancy and uptake.
Visit ACP’s Immunization Hub for resources and more information.
ACP Advocacy in Action
ACP embarks on different ways to educate and promote action by policy makers, legislators, and others on issues of importance to internal medicine physicians and your patients.
- 471 ACP members participated in ACP’s Leadership Day in Washington, DC; attendees came from 50 states and DC, and participated in 414 congressional meetings to bring visibility to key issues.
- In 2024, the Advocates for Internal Medicine Network (AIMn) facilitated more than 11,500 grassroots messages being sent from 3,200 advocates to lawmakers, advocating for state and federal legislation, along with federal rulemaking, to support internal medicine physicians and improve the health and wellbeing of patients and works to empower state chapters with personalized advocacy tools.
- In the first 100 days of the new presidential administration, AIMn advocates sent over 5,000 messages to lawmakers calling for them to protect Medicaid, fix Medicare physician payment, and fund GME programs, among other issues.
Want to Help ACP’s Advocacy Efforts?
- Stay informed by ACP’s Latest Advocacy page featuring articles, statements, and ways you can take action.
- Sign up for the ACP Advocate, a twice-monthly e-newsletter, to receive updates on public policy and regulatory issues. Log in to your ACP account and update your email preferences in settings today.
- Join the Advocates for Internal Medicine Network (AIMn) to let your members of Congress know about issues important to Internal Medicine physicians and your patients.