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This Week in Primary Care
PC4AA Continues to Grow: Welcome Primary Care for All Californians
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One of the most exciting aspects of a movement is the moment when it begins to take on a life of its own. This month, we are thrilled to celebrate exactly that.
The California Physicians Alliance (CaPA) has officially launched Primary Care for All Californians (PC4AC) in collaboration with Primary Care for All Americans. California now joins a growing network of state organizations working toward a shared vision: ensuring that every person has access to a trusted primary care clinician and that every community has the primary care infrastructure it needs to thrive.
This is more than a new state workgroup: it is evidence that the ideas behind PC4AA resonate across the country.
California's announcement highlights challenges that have become all too familiar nationwide. Health insurance doesn’t remove the struggle to find a primary care clinician. Patients wait months for appointments. Communities face growing workforce shortages. Rural and underserved communities continue to experience some of the greatest barriers to care. These are not uniquely Californian problems. They are American problems. And they require solutions that recognize primary care as essential public infrastructure.
The launch of PC4AC reflects something we've been seeing throughout the past year: people are ready to have a different conversation about health care. Rather than focusing exclusively on insurance coverage or payment systems, more organizations are recognizing that access to primary care itself must become a national priority. Without primary care, insurance cards do not guarantee care. Without primary care, preventable illnesses become medical crises. Without primary care, emergency departments become overcrowded, specialists inherit problems that could have been prevented, and health care costs continue to rise.
One of the strengths of the PC4AA model has always been that meaningful reform can begin locally. Every state faces unique workforce challenges, payment structures, political environments, and community needs. State organizations allow local leaders to identify practical solutions while contributing to a shared national vision. California's launch demonstrates exactly how this model can work.
By bringing together a multitude of groups including healthcare workers, labor organizations, and advocates, to name a few, PC4AC will help elevate primary care as a statewide priority while contributing to the broader national movement. Their work will undoubtedly generate ideas and innovations that can benefit every state.
Over the past year, our movement has continued to grow through new partnerships, student engagement, policy discussions, research collaborations, and grassroots organizing. Now we can add another important milestone to that list.
The launch of Primary Care for All Californians reminds us that this movement belongs to everyone who believes health begins with accessible, relationship-based primary care. Whether you are practicing medicine, training to become a clinician, conducting research, organizing in your community, or advocating for better policy, there is a place for you in this work.
To everyone at the California Physicians Alliance: welcome to the movement.
To everyone in PC4AA who lives or works in California: please join PC4AC here.
We're excited to build this future together.
If you've been thinking about getting together a Primary Care for All Americans workgroup in your own community, now is the time. On to Texas, Maine, Illinois, Washington, Oregon and New Hampshire!
Tonight, please join PC4AA people from across the country to learn with Dr. Andrew Saal about the interplay between communities and community health centers!
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