[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 111 (Thursday, July 25, 1996)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E1374-E1375]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               THE TERMINALLY ILL'S RIGHT TO BENEFITS ACT

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                        HON. WILLIAM O. LIPINSKI

                              of illinois

                    in the house of representatives

                        Thursday, July 25, 1996

  Mr. LIPINSKI. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to introduce a bill that will 
provide greatly needed financial relief to individuals that are 
inflicted with a terminal illness. Currently, terminally ill 
individuals must wait for the standard 5-month waiting period before 
the first social security disability payment can be received. However, 
many people with such illnesses tragically pass away before they ever 
receive any payments.
  Sick pay, temporary disability programs, and other private disability 
pension programs do not often cover a period as long as 5 months, and 
the gap in income during the waiting period affects terminally ill 
individuals when they can least afford it. Besides, these people have 
paid money into the Social Security System through payroll taxes and 
have a right to receive immediate benefits that would greatly diminish 
the hardships that are suddenly confronted by the terminally ill.
  According to the Social Security Administration, the 5-month waiting 
period was instituted to ensure that people are sufficiently disabled 
to qualify for benefits. I strongly feel that terminal patients should, 
in now way, be made to justify their condition. Moreover, medical 
science has developed to a point where the art of diagnosing terminally 
ill, and therefore, disabling conditions, provides a sufficiently 
reliable picture of the severity of the illness. This bill would define 
terminally ill patients as one that has an illness which is expected to 
result in death within the 12 months.
  I urge all of my colleagues to join me as cosponsors of this very 
important legislation. Unfortunately, many Americans are hit with a 
merciless terminal illness while in the prime of their lives, and we 
should grant them their right to collect disability payments that they 
have earned so that they can worry less about

[[Page E1375]]

financial concerns and live the rest of their lives in dignity.

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