[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 9]
[House]
[Page 11931]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                               ZIKA VIRUS

  (Mr. CARDENAS asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. CARDENAS. Mr. Speaker, in the United States, the Zika virus is 
spreading faster and infecting more people every single day. We are 
staring down the barrel of a new Flint water crisis, yet we fail to act 
because we are arguing over a price tag while Americans are truly 
paying the price every day. The March of Dimes estimates that the cost 
of treating one child with microcephaly may be more than $10 million 
over that person's lifetime.
  Right now, according to the CDC, the Centers for Disease Control, 
over 14,000 people have been infected with the Zika virus right here in 
the United States so far, and 20 babies have already been born with 
birth defects.
  Like Flint, the longer we wait, the more this will cost the American 
public. Congress must act immediately. We must get ahead of this 
epidemic and slow the threat of the Zika virus across the United 
States.
  Whether you are White, Black, man, woman, a doctor, or a child, the 
virus does not discriminate. No one is immune.

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