In June, the federal government announced $300 million would go to 1,300 community health centers.
Earlier this month, the federal government announced another $100 million would go to these centers.
It's all part of a promised $11 billion over five years from the Affordable Care Act to expand the primary care treatment system in the United States.
After all, the goal of the multiphased ACA is to get people insured and get people treated when they need medical care.
Community health centers, dotting the nation with more than 8,500 sites are a ready-made infrastructure to provide that kind of health care coverage.
But what are these community health centers and why do they deserve such a significant investment?
According to Kaiser Family Foundation in 2011, the centers provided 80 million visits to about 20 million patients, primarily for medical care, but also for dental, behavioral health, and enabling services.
More than 70 percent of health center patients are below the federal poverty level. Most are working-age adults (60 percent) and children (33 percent), and about 7 percent are seniors. Over half are members of racial or ethnic minority groups.
Health centers serve more than one in six low-income people nationally. Since 2009, they have increased the total number of patients served every year by 4 million, going from 17.1 million patients seen to 21.1 million, according to the Department of Health Resources Services Administration, their primary health care funder.
"This network of health centers has created one of the largest safety net systems of primary and preventive care in the world with a true national impact," according to HRSA.
Kaiser says the health centers' ability to provide primary care and improve access to quality care while holding down costs "has been well documented."