[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 18 (Thursday, February 12, 2004)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1308-S1309]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. FRIST (for himself, Ms. Landrieu, Mr. Cochran, Mr. DeWine, 
        Mr. Bond, Mr. Warner, Mr. Talent, and Mrs. Hutchison):
  S. 2091. A bill to improve the health of health disparity population; 
to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
  Mr. FRIST. Mr. President, I am proud to join today with Senator Mary 
Landrieu, Senator Thad Cochran, Senator Mike DeWine, Senator 
Christopher Bond, Senator James Talent, Senator John Warner, and 
Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison to introduce the ``Closing the Health Care 
Gap Act of 2004.''
  Earlier today, I was pleased to be joined at a press conference by an 
impressive array of leaders in this fight--Dr. Louis Sullivan, Dr. Rene 
Rodriguez, Dr. Randall Maxey, Dr. John Maupin, and Dr. James Gavin. I 
appreciate their support for this legislation, and also appreciate the 
support

[[Page S1309]]

of other national leaders committed to closing the health care 
disparity gap in America.
  Last May, in a speech to graduating students and families at 
Morehouse University's School of Medicine, I outlined a framework for 
action to combat disparities. Since then, I have reached out broadly 
and worked with a wide range of stakeholders and leaders to gather 
their input and ideas to ensure the legislation we are introducing 
today includes the best possible strategies to eliminate health 
disparities. I am also proud to be joined today by a number of 
colleagues who are committed to this cause. I particularly want to 
thank Senator Landrieu for working across party lines on this 
bipartisan legislation.
  As former Surgeon General Louis W. Sullivan, MD, said at a press 
briefing earlier today on this legislation, ``[e]thnic minorities 
represent the fastest growing segment of the U.S. population, and 
therefore, it is critical that we have a sustained and coordinated 
commitment to addressing this national problem. The ``Closing the 
Health Care Gap Act'' seeks to do that. . .''
  This legislation builds on past bipartisan efforts to address 
disparities in our health care system--most importantly, the ``Minority 
Health and Health Disparities Research and Education Act of 2000,'' 
which I authored with Senator Edward Kennedy.
  The legislation we are introducing today goes much farther.
  Over recent years, we have made tremendous advances in our knowledge 
of and fight against disease. But we know that millions of Americans 
still experience disparities in health outcomes as a result of 
ethnicity, race, gender, or limited access to quality health care. For 
example, disparity populations exhibit poorer health outcomes and have 
higher rates of HIV/AIDS, diabetes, infant mortality, cancer, heart 
disease, and other illnesses.
  African Americans and Native Americans die younger than any other 
racial or ethnic group.
  African Americans and Native American babies die at significantly 
higher rates than the rest of the population.
  African Americans, Native Americans, and Hispanic Americans are at 
least twice as likely to suffer from diabetes and experience serious 
complications from diabetes.
  These gaps are simply unacceptable in America today. Let me repeat, 
they are unacceptable. And, today, we begin a new and aggressive effort 
to address these inequities.
  The root causes of the health care disparities are multiple and 
certainly complex. That is why we need a broad and comprehensive 
approach to reduce and eliminate these disparities. This legislation 
takes a bold step in that direction.
  Many of our Nation's smartest minds have examined this problem in 
detail. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) in its landmark report 
``Unequal Treatment,'' concluded that health care disparities are 
caused by socioeconomic factors, language barriers, access to services 
problems, behavioral risk factors, and cultural issues including, 
unfortunately, mistrust and misunderstanding of some patients toward 
the health care system.
  The ``Closing the Health Care Gap Act'' directly addresses the root 
causes of health care disparities by focusing on five key areas: 
expanding access to quality health care; strengthening national 
leadership efforts and coordination; helping increase the diversity of 
health professionals; promoting more aggressive health professional 
education intended to reduce barriers to care; and enhancing research 
to identify sources of racial, ethnic, and geographic disparities and 
assess promising intervention strategies.
  More specifically, this bill: promotes improved understanding of the 
quality of health care delivered to racial and ethnic minorities and 
health disparity populations; improves collection and reporting of data 
on the health care of racial and ethnic minorities and health disparity 
populations; reduces some of the fragmentation of health care delivery 
experienced by disparity populations; strengthens the doctor-patient 
relationship by providing a series of tools to improve communication 
and continuity of care; supports the use of community health workers; 
supports the implementation of multidisciplinary treatment and 
preventive care teams; improves education and information to allow 
patients to better manage and control their own care; and increases the 
proportion of racial and ethnic minorities among health professionals.

  It is important that we act, as well, because health care disparities 
magnify many of the quality deficiencies in our overall health care 
system. This point was well documented by the IOM in a series of 
reports issued during the past several years. Therefore, the bill takes 
aggressive steps to improve the quality of health care for all 
Americans.
  A key part of this effort necessarily involves the need to strive for 
greater standardization of health data collection. At the same time, we 
must ensure that this information allows us to better identify and 
address gaps in our health care system by including important 
information about patients' race and ethnicity.
  While the Federal Government has a critical role to play, it is 
important to remember that government alone is incapable of closing the 
care and treatment gaps which exist in our health care system. 
Therefore, the legislation promotes partnerships between the Government 
and the private sector, and fosters collaboration at the community 
level to improve care, as well as access to care.
  The bill expands access to quality health care for minority and 
underserved patients through a community-based model that seeks to help 
patients utilize health coverage that may be available, to provide 
health system patient navigator services so that they may best utilize 
available coverage, to emphasize health awareness, prevention and 
health literacy efforts so that patients can effectively take part in 
their or their children's treatment decisions, and to improve chronic 
disease management.
  Turning our back on these health disparity problems would be a 
national failure. Every American deserves the best quality of health 
care possible, regardless of their race, ethnicity, gender, or where 
they live.
  Again, I appreciate the commitment of many of my colleagues. 
Together, I know we can make great progress against this critical 
problem.
  There is a growing awareness on the national level of the existence 
and importance of the serious disparities in the quality of health care 
that many minority and underserved Americans receive. This presents us 
with an important opportunity to move forward.
  My intention is to continue to build this national awareness, which 
can provide the basis for bipartisan efforts to fight and reduce these 
disparities. Today's bipartisan bill introduction represents a key step 
in this process.
  I would like to very quickly thank some of the organizations that are 
supporting this bill: Interamerican College of Physicians and Surgeons, 
National Hispanic Medical Association, National Medical Association, 
The National Conference for Community and Justice, The Association of 
Minority Health Professions Schools, National Urban League, American 
Association of Family Physicians, National Patient Advocate Foundation, 
National Association of Community Health Centers, Health Choice 
Network, National Association of Public Hospitals, American Hospital 
Association, The Endocrine Society, St. Thomas Health Services, 
Ascension Health, The American Society of Transplantation.
  With this strong base of initial support, the broad consensus that is 
beginning to emerge on this issue, and the bipartisan commitment of so 
many, it is my hope that we can make real progress toward eliminating 
health care disparities and end--once and for all--this intolerable 
blight on our Nation.
                                 ______