New Look at Health in Milwaukee: City of Milwaukee Health Department Releases Community Health Assessment

MILWAUKEE – The City of Milwaukee Health Department (MHD) has released its 2025 Community Health Assessment (CHA), the city’s most comprehensive snapshot of health and well-being. Built using quantitative data and direct input from more than 3,400 Milwaukee residents, the CHA examines how social factors, lived experiences, and built environments shape health outcomes over time.

Based on that input, five priority health issues emerged in the assessment: chronic disease, maternal and child health, mental health, substance use, and violence and injury. The assessment also found that injury and violence are leading drivers of premature death and disability in Milwaukee and documented disparities in education, housing, infant death rates, and life expectancy following the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 2025 CHA is MHD’s first city-specific assessment since 2022. For the first time, MHD completed the state-required CHA on a three-year cycle, rather than the previous five-year schedule, to provide more timely data for public health planning and collaboration.

The findings will help guide MHD’s work and inform its Community Health Improvement Plan (CHIP), which is executed through MKE Elevate, a community-driven partnership focused on improving health outcomes across Milwaukee. The CHA also serves as a shared reference for collaboration among City departments, health care providers, community organizations, policymakers, and residents.

“The Milwaukee Health Department’s Community Health Assessment is a resource for the entire city,” said Mayor Cavalier Johnson. “It provides a shared foundation for City departments and our partners to make informed decisions that support healthier communities. Whether you’re working in housing, public safety, transportation, economic development, or community services, this data helps us understand how our work connects to health and where collaboration can make the biggest difference.”

To help make the findings more accessible, MHD has also published a companion blog post that walks readers through the purpose of the CHA, how it was developed, how it can be used, and what the data reveals about health in Milwaukee today.

• 2025 Community Health Assessment
  • For a high-level overview, refer to the Executive Summary beginning on page 9.
• Blog post: Taking Milwaukee’s Pulse: Inside the 2025 Community Health Assessment

Se incluye una versión en español de este comunicado de prensa.

NOTE: This press release was submitted to Urban Milwaukee and was not written by an Urban Milwaukee writer. While it is believed to be reliable, Urban Milwaukee does not guarantee its accuracy or completeness.