[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 122 (Thursday, July 30, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6190-S6191]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Ms. COLLINS (for herself and Mr. Coons):
  S. 1911. A bill to implement policies to end preventable maternal, 
newborn, and child deaths globally; to the Committee on Foreign 
Relations.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, today I am very pleased to be joined by 
my colleague from Delaware, Senator Chris Coons, in introducing the 
Reach Every Mother and Child Act of 2015. The purpose of our bill is to 
improve the health and well-being of women and children in developing 
countries. Every day approximately 800 women will die from preventable 
causes related to pregnancy and childbirth.
  In addition, more than 17,000 children under the age of 5 will die 
each day of treatable conditions such as prematurity, pneumonia, and 
diarrhea, with malnutrition being the underlying cause in nearly half 
those deaths. While progress has been made in improving the health of 
mothers and their children, it is a tragedy that so many preventable 
deaths still occur, especially given that there are many effective and 
established lifesaving maternal and child health protocols and 
policies.
  These lifesaving interventions include clean birthing practices, 
vaccines, nutritional supplements, hand washing with soap, and other 
basic needs that remain elusive for far too many women and children in 
developing countries.
  Our legislation would strengthen the American government's commitment 
to ending preventable deaths of mothers, newborns, and young children 
in the developing world. There are simple, proven, cost-effective 
interventions which we know will work if we can reach the mothers and 
children who need them to survive. Our bill will also allow us to 
leverage greater investments from other parties, especially the private 
sector, partner governments, private foundations, and multinational 
organizations.
  According to USAID, a concentrated effort could end preventable 
maternal and child deaths worldwide by the year 2035. However, U.S. 
leadership and support of the international community are critical to 
meeting this goal.
  The U.S. Agency for International Development--USAID--has set an 
ambitious interim goal of preventing the deaths of 15 million children 
and 600,000 women in the next 5 years to ensure steadfast progress 
toward the ultimate goal. Due in part to American leadership and 
generosity, many lives have already been saved. Since 1990 the annual 
number of deaths of children under the age of 5 has been cut in half. 
Nevertheless, far too many mothers, newborns, and young children under 
the age of 5 still succumb to disease and malnutrition that could 
easily be prevented. The deployment of interventions that have proved 
to be successful must be accelerated.
  Our bill would require the administration to develop a 10-year 
strategy to achieve the goal of preventing these deaths by the year 
2035. Our bill would charge USAID with meeting that goal.
  One provision of our bill would establish a maternal and child 
survival coordinator at USAID who would focus on implementing the 10-
year strategy and verifying that the most effective interventions are 
scaled up in target countries. Our bill would also establish an 
interagency working group to assist the coordinator in promoting 
greater collaboration among all the Federal agencies involved in this 
effort.
  To promote transparency and greater accountability, our bill requires 
that detailed reporting be published on the Foreign Assistance 
Dashboard, where it can be assessed by the public, Congress, and 
nongovernmental organizations to track the implementation of the 
strategy and the progress being made.
  Finally, the United States cannot and should not take on the goal of 
eradicating these preventable deaths alone. Our bill recognizes this 
reality and requires the administration to develop a financing 
framework which would allow the use of U.S. Government dollars to 
leverage additional commitments from the private sector, nonprofit 
organizations, partner countries, and multinational organizations. As 
other investments grow, the need for U.S. Government assistance would 
decline. At a time when we must make very difficult decisions regarding 
Federal priorities in our budget, this is an important and responsible 
provision that ultimately will reduce the reliance on U.S. Government 
contributions.
  Improving the health and well-being of mothers and children around 
the world has far-reaching social and economic benefits as well. An 
independent group of economists and global health experts from around 
the world, known as the Lancet Commission, indicated that the return on 
investment in global health initiatives is very high. In fact, for 
every $1 invested, there is a return of $9 to $20 in growing the gross 
domestic product of the country receiving the investment.
  Other global health initiatives, such as the successful President's 
Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, which was started by 
President George Bush, demonstrate that results-risen interventions can 
turn the tide for global health challenges such as maternal and child 
survival. Taking lessons learned from past initiatives, our bill would 
provide the focus and the tools necessary to accelerate progress toward 
ending preventable maternal and child deaths.
  I urge my colleagues to take a close look at the bill we are 
introducing today and to join Senator Coons and me in supporting this 
bill to save the lives of mothers and children around the world.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
  Mr. COONS. Mr. President, I join my colleague from Maine on the floor 
this afternoon to talk about what we can do to save the lives of 
newborn children and their mothers in some of the poorest communities 
around our globe.
  I wish to start by thanking Senator Collins for her impressive 
leadership and for the energy she has brought to this work. I share her 
belief that our bipartisan bill, which is called the Reach Every Mother 
and Child Act or just the REACH Act, will go a long way toward 
eliminating preventable maternal and child deaths and will do so in an 
impressively targeted and cost-effective way.
  The preventable death of newborns, their mothers, and children under 
5 is a genuine tragedy that remains a widespread reality in far too 
many places around our world today. As Senator Collins said, 17,000 
children a day lose their lives to preventable diseases such as 
pneumonia, diarrhea, and malaria--illnesses we know how to not just 
treat but prevent--and worldwide, 3 million children will lose their 
lives to malnutrition this year. Nearly 3 million newborns die every 
year, 1 million of whom don't live to their second day, and 300,000 
women don't get to experience the joy of raising their child as either 
pregnancy or birth takes their lives. I doubt it would come to any 
surprise to those in this Chamber today that it is the families who are 
living in the poorest communities in the developing world who are most 
at risk.
  So what brings Senator Collins and me to the floor today is the fact 
that there are things we can do to prevent these deaths from ever 
happening and to do so in a cost-effective and transparent way. Since I 
first entered office, I have been confronted with challenges both at 
home and around the world that demand our action but where real 
solutions remain out of the reach of this Senate or our government. 
This is not one of those issues.
  Some doubt that we can make a lasting and meaningful impact on the 
poorest of the poor in the developing world, but the fact is, we have 
made real progress. It was time spent in east Africa 30 years ago that 
first really changed my life and engaged me passionately in these 
issues. What is striking is how much progress we have actually made. 
Over the past 25 years, we have cut in half the number of children and 
mothers who have died, the number of children under 5, and mothers who 
die in illnesses associated with

[[Page S6191]]

childbirth. Mortality rates are now declining faster than ever. And 
while we do face real and seemingly intractable challenges across the 
international landscape, our progress on this issue remains a telling 
sign of what is possible when we pull together and apply thoughtful 
interventions.
  Just last year the administration took an important next step, laying 
out a new strategy with ambitious goals--saving the lives of 15 million 
children and 600,000 women by the end of this decade. Think about the 
scope and reach of the change that would mean for families and for 
communities in some of the poorest places on this planet. These goals 
are based in the lessons we have learned about what really works. 
Providing neonatal care to expectant mothers works. Vaccinating young 
children works. Providing access to clean water so that children don't 
die from diarrhea works. Providing HIV-positive mothers with 
antiretroviral drugs works.
  I am hopeful about our ability to find cost-effective solutions 
because many of these remedies are simple things which are already at 
work here in our own country and which we as Americans take for 
granted. In the United States, what would be a fairly routine 
complication of childbirth would, in many communities in the developing 
world, be a life-or-death situation.
  For example, let me talk for a moment about something called a 
resuscitation bag--a simple piece of plastic that costs just a few 
dollars. Most American parents have either seen one used or ready to be 
used in the delivery room. We know that in an American hospital--and it 
should be in the hospital of any developed country--when a nurse needs 
a resuscitation bag for a newborn who is struggling to breathe, it is 
right there and waiting. But in the poorest communities, where newborns 
are losing their lives at astounding rates, a significant factor is the 
simple absence of these bags to save the lives of newborns. When a 
nurse--if there is even a nurse--reaches for one, there is none to be 
found. Yet these simple devices that cost just a few dollars could save 
literally hundreds or thousands of lives.
  So what our bipartisan REACH Act does is recognize that many of the 
steps we can take are very much within our grasp, and our bill would 
take these solutions a step further by reforming them and scaling them 
up so they have a larger, longer term impact.
  Our bill would increase coordination to better implement U.S. 
strategies with the goal of ending preventable maternal, newborn, and 
child deaths within 20 years. It would build new partnerships with the 
private sector, improve coordination across agencies, and insist on 
real targets and transparent and measurable progress. It would also, as 
Senator Collins referenced, allow U.S. Government dollars to be 
leveraged. And I love it when we leverage our resources with the 
private sector, with multilateral donors, and with our partner 
countries in the developing world. Critically, it would focus on the 
most effective interventions in the poorest and most vulnerable 
communities and put in place targets that can be effectively tracked.
  These communities in the poorest parts of our planet face many 
challenges, but when it comes to saving the lives of young mothers and 
children, we know exactly what it will take to make a meaningful 
difference. Today, together, we are offering a strong path forward.
  I close by urging my colleagues to follow the real leadership of 
Senator Collins and to join both of us in ensuring that American 
ingenuity and leadership can continue to save lives and to offer 
communities around our world a brighter future.
  Thank you.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Maine.
  Ms. COLLINS. Mr. President, I wish to thank the Senator from Delaware 
for his very eloquent statement. I know how passionate he is about 
helping people, particularly in Africa. He has extraordinary expertise 
about that region of the world, about that continent, and has been 
there many times. I look forward to working with him to make this bill 
a law. It is bipartisan, and it should bring people together across 
party lines. I hope we will be able to get it signed into law this 
year.
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