[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 49 (Thursday, March 16, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Page S4093]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


   HEALTH PROFESSIONS CONSOLIDATION AND REAUTHORIZATION BILL--S. 555

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, access to quality health care for all 
should be a central goal of the American health care system. But for 
too often, we fail to achieve it. Lack of access is an especially 
serious problem for people in underserved rural and urban areas.
  Health insurance coverage for all is an essential part of making good 
health care widely available, but it is only a part of the solution. 
The success of health reform also depends heavily on our ability to 
train an adequate number of more health professionals. No health care 
system can function effectively without an adequate supply of well-
trained and capable physicians and other providers.
  The past two decades have seen impressive increases in the total 
number of health care professionals. The quality of training in 
American medicine is generally superb. Despite these successes, 
however, some types of health professionals--particularly those in 
primary care--remain in short supply, and the distribution of health 
manpower leaves many parts of the country underserved, or barely served 
at all. The task of maintaining an adequate supply of professionals 
from disadvantaged backgrounds, who typically have a strong interest in 
serving underserved communities, remains a major challenge. Millions of 
Americans, especially the very young and the elderly in underserved 
communities, have little or no access to primary and clinical 
preventive health care services.
  The dual purpose of our current health professions programs is to 
train more health professionals in occupations where the supply is too 
low, and to encourage them to locate and remain in underserved areas.
  An important subsidiary goal is to assist disadvantaged students and 
institutions training these students, in order to expand the 
opportunities of those from disadvantaged backgrounds to enter the 
health professionals and to help meet the needs of underserved areas. 
These are programs that work. As studies have shown again and again, 
health providers from disadvantaged backgrounds are far more likely to 
practice their professions in underserved communities. That needed 
result is enhanced by community-based training, which also encourages 
health professionals to stay on in underserved and shortage areas.
  Training programs under titles VII and VIII of the Public Health 
Service Act are the key mechanisms by which the Federal Government 
provides assistance to medical students and encourages the training of 
health professionals to meet national priorities. These programs are 
overdue for consolidation and better targeting, and I commend Senator 
Kassebaum on the constructive role she has played in analyzing these 
programs and proposing meaningful, practical reforms. I look forward to 
continuing to work with Senator Kassebaum and with the Clinton 
administration to achieve these goals responsibly and maintain adequate 
levels of resources. We must advance, rather than undercut, the central 
goal of these two titles of the Public Health Service Act--to train a 
health work force that can meet the needs of the American people.
  This important legislation will enhance the quality of the Nation's 
health professions work force and, by doing so, it will drastically 
improve the health and well-being of our people. I look forward to its 
enactment.


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