National Injury Prevention Day is an annual event dedicated to raising awareness about injury prevention and promoting safety in our communities. On November 18, 2026, organizations across the country will come together to share knowledge, resources, and strategies for preventing injuries and violence.

Our mission is to empower individuals and communities with the tools and information they need to prevent injuries and create safer environments for everyone. Through education, advocacy, and collaboration, we work to reduce the burden of preventable injuries and save lives.

We want to highlight the incredible people in your coalitions and networks who are saving lives. Tell us about those making a difference locally:

• First Responder: Firefighter, Police Officer, EMS, lifeguard
  
• School Advocate: teacher, school nurse, counselor, custodian, school safety officer, crossing guard, food service person.
  
• Everyday Neighbors: Anyone on your block

Learn more about National Injury Prevention Day and submit your local heroes here!

Since its inception, National Injury Prevention Day (NIPD) has mobilized communities, strengthened partnerships, and amplified awareness about the burden of unintentional and intentional injury across the United States. What began in 2020 with participation from 22 cities as an effort to continue to highlight the devastating effects of injuries and the need for injury prevention education throughout the pandemic has grown into a nationwide movement engaging diverse stakeholders and communities.

Access the full report here.

Federal funding decisions do not begin when a grant opens. They begin months earlier, inside budget requests, subcommittee allocations, committee reports, hearings, markups and negotiations that most people never see until the outcome is already fully baked. 

That is the problem this guide solves.

The Global Health Advocacy Incubator’s (GHAI) Overdose Prevention Initiative created the U.S. Federal Appropriations Action Guide to help advocates understand where federal funding decisions happen, when to engage and how to make a clear, timely request. The guide walks users through the full budget and appropriations process, from the difference between authorization and appropriations to 302(b) allocations, continuing resolutions, committee report language and written testimony. Every concept is paired with public health examples and practical tools advocates can adapt for their own work. 

This is a working tool, built to be used in the middle of a live funding cycle.

The stakes are concrete. Appropriations for overdose prevention determine whether agencies and programs have the funding to support overdose prevention, treatment access, recovery services, surveillance, harm reduction, injury prevention, suicide prevention, crisis services and state and local public health capacity. Advocates who understand the process can move earlier, ask more precisely and help protect the programs communities depend on. 

Without that understanding, the process feels like a closed system. Strong evidence, urgent community need and a compelling story are not enough on their own. If the ask goes to the wrong office, misses the deadline or fails to name the right account, it can then disappear into the federal budget machine and get lost in the mix.

The guide is designed to keep that from happening.

What advocates can do with the guide
The U.S. Federal Appropriations Action Guide helps advocates move from "we need funding" to a request that congressional offices can understand and act on.

Advocates can use it to identify the right appropriations subcommittee, understand where their issue fits in the federal budget, draft a programmatic funding request, prepare written testimony, develop talking points, track committee action and follow up after funding decisions move from Congress to federal agencies.

The guide also explains why timing matters. Appropriations advocacy is a year-round effort, and the entry points shift as the cycle moves. Agencies begin planning before the President's Budget appears. Congress holds hearings, members submit requests, subcommittees mark up bills, committees release reports and final negotiations can shift priorities before enactment. The guide shows where advocates can enter at each stage instead of arriving after the door has already closed.

Learn more and access the Action Guide here!

Understanding Firearm Injury Data - this page is a part of our new NC Injury Data Users Toolkit and provides information on understanding firearm injury data.

Preventing Firearm Injury and Death - this page outlines important information around firearm injury and resources to prevent firearm injury and death.

NC Firearm Injury and Death Data - this page includes IVPB data products related to firearm injury and death.

The Library succinctly summarizes research and clinical insight and provides links to practical tools and resources that can be applied across healthcare and community settings. It helps organizations consider opportunities to strengthen prevention efforts and better support the individuals and communities they serve. 

Supporter Toolkit

Partner Toolkit

This new resource was created to help support more consistent messaging, education, and best practices related to life jacket and PFD use across boating, natural water recreation, pools, and supervised aquatic environments.

The document includes guidance on:

• Consistent terminology and public messaging around life jackets and PFDs
• Activity- and environment-specific recommendations
• Age- and ability-specific recommendations
• Fit, selection, maintenance, and performance considerations
• Layered drowning prevention strategies
• Policy, education, and risk management considerations
• Access to water safety resources and equipment

This resource guide from the Children’s Safety Now Alliance is available to help public health professionals find and use national data on child and adolescent injuries and violence. The guide covers 12 national data systems, explaining what each one captures, its strengths and limitations, and how to access it.

Download the guide here

CDC’s Mental Health Data Channel, first launched last year, continues to help the public access mental health data through easy-to-understand visuals and promotes resources to improve well-being and prevent mental distress.

CDC has enhanced its SUDORS Dashboard: Fatal Drug Overdose Data with new features to make fatal overdose data easier to explore, interpret, and act on. The centerpiece is a new trend view—giving you the ability to track overdose deaths over time by drugs involved, substances of interest detected, demographics, and circumstances.

These updates put the right data in front of you faster—so you can identify trends, target interventions, and make the case for resources in your jurisdiction. Spend less time wrestling with data and more time acting on it, with the visualizations and insights your prevention work depends on.


What else is new?
• Comparison over time: Compare changes within individual jurisdictions as a line or bar chart or view select statistics across jurisdictions as a map
• Pre-calculated summary statistics: Key statistics are provided throughout the dashboard to help viewers interpret and navigate data
• Customizable legends: Some charts feature legends that can be tailored for sharing and presentations
• Annual view updates: More flexible options for visualizing combinations of drugs/drug classes involved in overdose deaths
• Navigation improvements: A navigation panel lets viewers easily switch between all available views (e.g., annual data, trend view, preliminary data) and customize selections by years, jurisdictions, and dashboard sections
These improvements strengthen your overdose prevention efforts with more accurate, actionable insights.

Explore the updated SUDORS dashboard: https://www.cdc.gov/overdose-prevention/data-research/facts-stats/sudors-dashboard-fatal-overdose-data.html

The White House | May 6, 2026

Overdose threats are evolving. Our response must keep pace. Drug overdose remains one of the Nation’s most urgent public health challenges, taking nearly 210 lives every day. Overdose deaths fell by nearly 27 percent in 2024; provisional 2025 data suggest the continued decline is slowing and some states are trending upward. As the drug supply changes, stimulant-involved deaths are rising, and some jurisdictions are detecting ultra-potent opioids (e.g., carfentanil) and non-opioid sedative adulterants (e.g., xylazine and medetomidine). Coordination between public health and public safety is critical to ensure that we understand evolving overdose threats and leverage all available resources to effectively save lives. 

ORS unites public health and public safety to prevent overdose. The Overdose Response Strategy (ORS) is the only national program designed specifically to strengthen overdose prevention through this coordinated approach. Established over a decade ago through a formal partnership between the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and operationalized through the High Intensity Drug Trafficking Areas (HIDTA) Program and the CDC Foundation, the ORS builds partnerships and leverages data and tools to enable a coordinated approach to overdose prevention and response. ORS supports 61 two-person teams, a Drug Intelligence Officer (DIO) and a Public Health Analyst (PHA), embedded across all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. These teams are the operational core of the ORS. DIOs leverage law enforcement networks and intelligence to identify emerging threats and support supply reduction strategies, while PHAs analyze and translate overdose and drug related data, tailor evidence-based practices to local context, and evaluate promising interventions.

READ MORE HERE

Access the Tracker & Dashboard here.

How States Can Prevent Adverse Childhood Experiences Through Stability, Safety, and Support

Legislative Snapshot: Suicide Prevention Infrastructure and AI Chatbots

CDC’s Dating Matters has a new name: the Healthy Relationships Toolkit (HeaRT)! This rebrand emphasizes the program’s core focus – supporting adolescents as they build healthy, respectful relationships with peers, parents, and partners. In addition to the rebrand, the HeaRT Online Training for Parents has launched. This free, self-paced course offers parents and caregivers of 11- to 14-year-olds guidance on positive parenting techniques and communication skills.  

Explore the toolkit and take the training

"This month, I will be embarking on a new chapter and am leaving the Division of Violence Prevention. During my time at CDC, I have learned from some of the nation’s smartest people, all devoted to making a difference in public health. I cherish and will miss my colleagues’ and partners’ grace, kindness, and compassion.

Thinking about the work we’ve done together, my hope is that what has been built over decades—protecting lives, preventing harm, and improving quality of life in our communities—is sustained. Your expertise, dedication, and self-sacrifice are highly valued, and I hope that the public health voice is heard and applied to make positive changes.

As for what comes next for me personally, in a few months, I will return to academia, where I plan to continue working in violence, injury, and suicide prevention. The division is in good hands with a strong, dedicated leadership team, including Reshma Mahendra, the division's deputy director and shortly, acting director.

Mark Twain wrote, “It is never wrong to do the right thing.” May that compass always chart your path, and mine. I hope we work together soon, in new ways."

Take care,

Judy Schaechter

Director, Division of Violence Prevention  

1. Protecting vulnerable road users and slow-moving vehicles

2. Exploration of emerging trends in Iowa's trauma system

The Division of Environmental Health Services Injury Prevention Program announced the award of $2.65 million for 25 Tribal Injury Prevention Cooperative Agreement Program (TIPCAP) sites.  The total commitment for the new five-year cycle awards is $13 million. The 2026-2030 awardees include 17 new recipients and eight returning awardees from the previous TIPCAP funding cycle.

Sites were awarded under the Part I or Part II components:

• Part I: Up to $150,000 per year for five years to hire a full-time injury prevention coordinator. 
• Part II: Up to $40,000 per year for five years for project-based injury prevention initiatives. 

TIPCAP builds capacity to reduce injuries and violence for American Indian and Alaska Native people through community-driven, culturally centered approaches. This is the seventh TIPCAP funding opportunity for the IHS Injury Prevention Program. Congratulations to the  2026-2030 TIPCAP team!

Safe States staff, in support of the Washington State Department of Health, convened and facilitated the Washington State Gender-Based Violence Prevention (WGBVP) Collaborative over the last several years. Through a series of activities that led to a shared interest in a statewide collective impact project, the group worked together to develop a vision and a path to promote narrative change strategies that support healthy relationships and gender-based violence prevention. As a result of this collaborative effort, the “Changing the Narrative, Changing the Culture” narrative change toolkit was developed.

The toolkit, which provides practical frameworks and skill‑building tools to support organizations and communities in building effective, aligned, and values‑based narrative change strategies across Washington state, also serves as a resource for any program interested in narrative change work.

Federal decisions shape what communities can do. Funding rules, program guidance and legislative timelines can speed up proven solutions or slow them down. Advocacy works best when people set a clear goal, name a specific ask and follow through with intention. 

The overdose crisis demands durable policy action and many advocates closest to the harm still face barriers to navigating Congress. This is why the Overdose Prevention Initiative at the Global Health Advocacy Incubator (GHAI) launched the U.S. Federal Advocacy Action Guide, now available on their free online learning platform, the Health Advocacy Training and Collaboration Hub (HATCH). 

This guide is designed to support advocates who want to engage federal decision-makers with clarity and confidence. It offers a practical roadmap for individuals and groups seeking to understand how Congress works and how community voices can shape policy and funding decisions. 

The guide supports advocates, impacted communities, service providers, public health leaders, and coalition partners by: 

• Breaking down federal advocacy into clear, manageable steps 

• Explaining who holds decision-making power and when 

• Helping groups align messages, identify a specific ask and plan effective outreach 

Read more about this resource on their blog! 

"This guide fills a real gap. It helps us understand not just what to advocate for, but how to do it effectively at the federal level, while staying grounded in the realities facing people most impacted by overdose." - Tamara Olt, Executive Director, Broken No More  

"The Federal Advocacy Action Guide is an invaluable resource for recovery advocates. It provides practical tools, real examples and a clear pathway for engaging Congress in a way that is coordinated, credible and rooted in lived experience." - Patty McCarthy, CEO, Faces and Voices of Recovery  

Whether you are brand new to federal advocacy or building on existing efforts, this resource is designed to help advocates move from concern to action and to mobilize in ways that can save lives. 

Access the U.S. Federal Advocacy Action Guide and related tools on HATCH here: 
http://www.hatchadvocacy.org/us-federal-advocacy-action-guide 

The NSC Workplace Wellbeing Program is excited to share that we’ve officially launched new mental health resources in the NSC Workplace Wellbeing Hub, with new additions available across the Hub stations (including policies, benefits, training, data collection and risk-based education).

These resources were developed to help safety professionals and organizations strengthen workplace mental health, psychological safety, reduce stigma, and support employee wellbeing with practical, evidence-informed tools that can be implemented right away.

What’s new:

• 15 new mental health tools and resources added across the Hub stations

• Quick, practical guidance designed for real-world workplace use in safety-critical industries

• Resources that support employers, employees, supervisors, safety leaders and frontline teams

You can explore the updated Hub here: NSC Workplace Wellbeing Hub

In this opinion piece, Dr. Debra Houry, former Chief Medical Officer of the CDC, reflects on her resignation 100 days earlier and argues that her worst fears about the agency are being realized. She says she left the CDC because scientific integrity and public-health infrastructure were being undermined under Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and that conditions have continued to deteriorate since her departure.

Read the full article here.