[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 128 (Wednesday, September 22, 2010)]
[House]
[Pages H6842-H6843]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
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NATIONALLY ENHANCING THE WELLBEING OF BABIES THROUGH OUTREACH AND
RESEARCH NOW ACT
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the
bill (H.R. 3470) to authorize funding for the creation and
implementation of infant mortality pilot programs in standard
metropolitan statistical areas with high rates of infant mortality, and
for other purposes, as amended.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The text of the bill is as follows:
H.R. 3470
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 ``Nationally Enhancing the
Wellbeing of Babies through Outreach and Research Now Act''
or the ``NEWBORN Act''.
SEC. 2. INFANT MORTALITY PILOT PROGRAMS.
Section 330H of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C.
254c-8) is amended--
(1) by redesignating subsection (e) as subsection (f);
(2) by inserting after subsection (d) the following:
``(e) Infant Mortality Pilot Programs.--
``(1) In general.--The Secretary, acting through the
Administrator, shall award grants to eligible entities to
create, implement, and oversee infant mortality pilot
programs.
``(2) Period of a grant.--The period of a grant under this
subsection shall be 5 consecutive fiscal years.
``(3) Preference.--In awarding grants under this
subsection, the Secretary shall give preference to eligible
entities proposing to serve any of the 15 counties or groups
of counties with the highest rates of infant mortality in the
United States in the past 3 years.
``(4) Use of funds.--Any infant mortality pilot program
funded under this subsection may--
``(A) include the development of a plan that identifies the
individual needs of each community to be served and
strategies to address those needs;
``(B) provide outreach to at-risk mothers through programs
deemed appropriate by the Administrator;
``(C) develop and implement standardized systems for
improved access, utilization, and quality of social,
educational, and clinical services to promote healthy
pregnancies, full-term births, and healthy infancies
delivered to women and their infants, such as--
``(i) counseling on infant care, feeding, and parenting;
``(ii) postpartum care;
``(iii) prevention of premature delivery; and
``(iv) additional counseling for at-risk mothers, including
smoking cessation programs, drug treatment programs, alcohol
treatment programs, nutrition and physical activity programs,
postpartum depression and domestic violence programs, social
and psychological services, dental care, and parenting
programs;
``(D) establish a rural outreach program to provide care to
at-risk mothers in rural areas;
``(E) establish a regional public education campaign,
including a campaign to--
``(i) prevent preterm births; and
``(ii) educate the public about infant mortality; and
``(F) provide for any other activities, programs, or
strategies as identified by the community plan.
``(5) Limitation.--Of the funds received through a grant
under this subsection for a fiscal year, an eligible entity
shall not use more than 10 percent for program evaluation.
``(6) Reports on pilot programs.--
``(A) In general.--Not later than 1 year after receiving a
grant, and annually thereafter for the duration of the grant
period, each entity that receives a grant under paragraph (1)
shall submit a report to the Secretary detailing its infant
mortality pilot program.
``(B) Contents of report.--The reports required under
subparagraph (A) shall include information such as the
methodology of, and outcomes and statistics from, the
grantee's infant mortality pilot program.
``(C) Evaluation.--The Secretary shall use the reports
required under subparagraph (A) to evaluate, and conduct
statistical research on, infant mortality pilot programs
funded through this subsection.
``(7) Definitions.--For the purposes of this subsection:
``(A) Administrator.--The term `Administrator' means the
Administrator of the Health Resources and Services
Administration.
``(B) Eligible entity.--The term `eligible entity' means a
State, county, city, territorial, or tribal health department
that has submitted a proposal to the Secretary that the
Secretary deems likely to reduce infant mortality rates
within the standard metropolitan statistical area involved.
``(C) Tribal.--The term `tribal' refers to an Indian tribe,
a Tribal organization, or an Urban Indian organization, as
such terms are defined in section 4 of the Indian Health Care
Improvement Act.''; and
(3) by amending subsection (f), as so redesignated--
(A) in paragraph (1)--
(i) by amending the paragraph heading to read: ``Healthy
Start Initiative''; and
(ii) by inserting after ``carrying out this section'' the
following: ``(other than subsection (e))'';
(B) by redesignating paragraph (2) as paragraph (3);
(C) by inserting after paragraph (1) the following:
``(2) Infant mortality pilot programs.--To carry out
subsection (e), there is authorized to be appropriated
$10,000,000 for each of fiscal years 2011 through 2015.'';
and
(D) in paragraph (3)(A), as so redesignated, by striking
``the program under this section'' and inserting ``the
program under subsection (a)''.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from New
Jersey (Mr. Pallone) and the gentleman from Kentucky (Mr. Whitfield)
each will control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from New Jersey.
General Leave
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks
and include extraneous material in the Record.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentleman from New Jersey?
There was no objection.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, this bill authorizes a pilot program to address a
serious public health problem, and that is infant mortality. According
to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the U.S. infant
mortality rate is about 50 percent higher than the national goal of 4.5
infant deaths for per 1,000 births. As of 2005, the United States
ranked 30th in the world in infant mortality. The pilot program
authorized in this legislation would give grants to eligible entities
to fight infant mortality in the most impacted areas.
I want to thank Representative Cohen, the sponsor of the NEWBORN Act,
as it is called, for his deep commitment to and tireless leadership on
this very important issue. I would also like to thank Ranking Member
Barton and Ranking Member Shimkus and their staffs for working in a
bipartisan manner to help get this legislation to the House floor.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. WHITFIELD. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
There has been a lot of debate in the United States about infant
mortality. And when we hear that the U.S. ranks 30th in the world, it
certainly bothers all of us.
I do think it is important that we also recognize, just for
informational purposes, that not every country in the world uses the
same method to determine infant mortality. For example, in the United
States, all live births at any birthweight or gestational age must be
reported. In France, for example, only live births of at least 22 weeks
of gestation or weighing at least 500 grams must be reported. So some
of these countries use different reporting facts to determine their
mortality rates.
There is no question that certain communities in the United States
have infant mortality rates that are persistently high. And this
legislation authorizes HHS to award grants for pilot projects to reduce
infant mortality in the communities with the highest infant mortality
rates and would require these projects be evaluated to ensure we are on
the right track to reducing infant mortality rates in those areas and
in the United States.
I want to thank Congressman Cohen for his leadership on this issue as
well as Congressmen Pallone and Shimkus.
I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the
sponsor of the bill, Representative Cohen of Tennessee.
Mr. COHEN. I want to thank Mr. Pallone for the time, and I want to
thank Mr. Pallone, Mr. Andrews, and Chairman Waxman for their help in
getting this particular proposal to the floor; and the minority side as
well, Mr. Whitfield, my friend, Mr. Shimkus, and everyone who has
worked on this.
Mr. Speaker, this is a particularly important bill to me, and it's an
important bill to my district. September is Infant Mortality Awareness
Month, and it's appropriate that this month this bill will be brought
up for consideration, the NEWBORN Act. ``NEWBORN'' is an acronym.
Everything in
[[Page H6843]]
Washington seems to be an acronym, and this acronym, ``NEWBORN,''
stands for ``Nationally Enhancing the Wellbeing of Babies through
Outreach and Research Now.''
It is so important that we give children an opportunity to live and
mothers and fathers an opportunity to see their children born and have
a chance. My parents lost a child at about 4 months of age in 1946.
They never got over it. There are so many people who have lost
children, and it is something that stays with you forever.
In my particular city of Memphis--while we talked about the United
States' rate, we know it is too high no matter what it is and how you
keep statistics--the city of Memphis has one of the highest infant
mortality rates in the Nation. It is said to be second by the CDC among
the 60 largest urban areas in the year 2002. In one particular ZIP code
in my district, 38108, in the year 2007--it's in north Memphis, a
predominately low-income African American neighborhood. I say
predominately; it's an entirely low-income African American
neighborhood--had an infant mortality rate of 31 deaths per 1,000 live
births. That is almost five times the Nation's 2007 rate of seven
deaths per 1,000 live births. And that ranks 38108 as worse than the
developing nations of Iran, Indonesia, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Syria,
and Vietnam in infant mortality for that year.
It's an issue that can strike people of any race, but it is divided
largely along racial lines, and there's a great racial disparity. The
Office of Minority Health at the CDC has found that African Americans
have 2.4 times the infant mortality rate than whites, that African
Americans are four times as likely to die as infants due to
complications related to low birthweight when compared to white
infants. The CDC study found that African American mothers were 2.5
times more likely than white mothers to begin prenatal care in their
third trimester or not receive prenatal care at all. That's where a lot
of research and outreach can be done, particularly the outreach. That
is why the NEWBORN bill is so needed, and that is why our office
decided to make this our top priority.
My chief of staff, Marilyn Dilihay; my district director, Randy Wade;
and our whole team met in Memphis. Brittany Johnson, who is my
legislative director in the area of health care, and my legislative
director, Reisha Phills, the whole office worked on the issue and we
brought it as a bill. But we also had it included in the health care
bill that passed this House. And it was featured in the Speaker's
bullet points about what it could possibly do for infant mortality.
This would be the largest outreach program the Federal Government has
ever engaged in. It's an authorization to find answers for the problem
of infant mortality.
Of course, because of the situation of the politics in the Senate and
because we had to go to reconciliation, there wasn't a conference
committee, and this part of the health care bill wasn't included
because the Senate didn't have it, and reconciliation didn't allow
consideration of proposals like this that didn't add to or decrease
from the budget. This was an authorization. So it didn't make it
through the final phase because of what happened in Massachusetts, and
that hurt us in what could be an important step forward for mothers and
children.
We hope that the bill will pass here today and that the Senate will
pick it up. We hope Senator Mikulski or Senator Dodd or somebody will
help us with it, or Senator Harkin, and see that it gets through the
Senate and the authorization is approved.
It will authorize the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human
Services to award 5-year-long grants to 15 municipalities or States to
create infant mortality pilot programs. The legislation sets forth
guidelines on what practices the pilot programs may employ in their
quest to lower the infant mortality rate of the area they serve, and
those include outreach to at-risk mothers, increased access to
educational clinic services for pregnant women or potential mothers and
families.
The language suggests each program provide infant care counseling,
postpartum care, additional care for at-risk mothers, a rural outreach
program, and a public education program.
All of these can save money in the long run in health care because
some of the most expensive treatment rendered is for premature babies,
and care in these particular ages of life can be very expensive. And if
we can have better prenatal care and less problems, not only is it the
right thing to do in every way possible, but it also saves money.
It is my hope that those entities who apply for this funding will do
so in conjunction with existing local, private, and not-for-profit
groups that have already involved themselves in the fight against
infant mortality. And there are several in Memphis that have done that.
Our Governor, Phil Bredesen, and our city mayor and county mayor, A C
Wharton, have headed up programs in our community, and our county
mayor, Mark Luttrell, is continuing them.
The cultivation of partnerships between local leaders is essential in
order to ensure the problem is addressed in as efficient a manner as
possible.
I introduced the NEWBORN Act because of the number of devastating
instances of infant mortality in Memphis, but I hope its passage and
eventual enactment will help the incalculable number of people across
the country who are possibly at risk to lose a child or grandchild in
the years to come.
Again, I thank Mr. Pallone and the other Members, particularly Mr.
Waxman, for their help in getting this bill to the floor, and I hope
that we will have the help in the Senate that the mothers, children,
and grandchildren in this Nation deserve.
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Mr. WHITFIELD. Mr. Speaker, I urge all Members to support this
legislation, and I thank the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Cohen) and
others who worked hard on this legislation.
I yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, I urge that the bill pass, and I yield back
the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the
gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pallone) that the House suspend the
rules and pass the bill, H.R. 3470, as amended.
The question was taken.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
Mr. PALLONE. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX and the
Chair's prior announcement, further proceedings on this motion will be
postponed.
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