Assessment includes diagnosing illnesses and diseases. Policy development involves shaping positions on key health issues by the government. Assurance encompasses developing programs that attest to quality in the operations of state programs. Six examples of broad public health services provided by state governments include monitoring the health status to identify community health problems, diagnosing and investigating health problems, informing and educating the public, mobilizing community partnerships, evaluating effectiveness and accessibility, and research for new insights and innovative solutions. Sinnock continued to explain the different ways to privatize these services.
Contracting is the most frequent form of privatization.
About 94 percent of all efforts in the health arena take one of these four forms. The remaining 6 percent are mostly volunteerism, franchising, outright service shedding, the sale of assets, deregulation and private donations. Privatization of public health services is not new but an emphasis on implementing health programs quicker and cheaper is stronger than ever. According to Sinnock, governments at all levels have turned to the private sector to assist in the delivery of these public health services. In the spring of 1996, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did an environmental scan of state health departments, with the intention of building upon a 1993 study completed by The Council of State Governments, looking specifically at public health.