[Congressional Bills 111th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 998 Introduced in Senate (IS)]

111th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                 S. 998

 To amend title II of the Social Security Act to eliminate the 5-month 
   waiting period in the disability insurance program, and for other 
                               purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                              May 7, 2009

    Mr. Brown (for himself, Mr. Leahy, and Mr. Reed) introduced the 
 following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on 
                                Finance

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To amend title II of the Social Security Act to eliminate the 5-month 
   waiting period in the disability insurance program, and for other 
                               purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Arthur Woolweaver, Jr., Social 
Security Act Improvements for the Terminally Ill Act''.

SEC. 2. ELIMINATION OF TITLE II WAITING PERIOD FOR TERMINALLY ILL 
              INDIVIDUALS.

    (a) In General.--Section 223(a)(1) of the Social Security Act (42 
U.S.C. 423(a)(1)) is amended by adding at the end the following new 
sentence: ``In the case of any application for disability insurance 
benefits filed by an individual who is determined to be under a 
disability and who has been certified as terminally ill by a physician 
(as defined in section 1861(r)(1)), this paragraph shall be applied 
without regard to any waiting period. For the purposes of the preceding 
sentence, an individual is considered to be terminally ill if the 
individual has a medical prognosis that the individual's life 
expectancy is 6 months or less.''.
    (b) Effective Date.--The amendment made by this section shall take 
effect with respect to applications filed after the date of the 
enactment of this Act.
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