Tuesday, January 22, 2013

House Passes HR 307 – Medical Preparedness


This afternoon the House passed HR 307, the Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Reauthorization Act of 2013, by a bipartisan vote of 395 to 29. In fact, the 29 votes against were all Republicans. The forty minutes allocated for debate only took 17 minutes. I expect that when it comes to a vote in the Senate, it will pass with similar results.

Unfortunately, this consensus on the current language will insure that there will be no attempt to amend the bill to correct the lack of a requirement for chemical facilities with reportable quantities of toxic inhalation hazard (TIH) chemicals to report those chemicals to local medical treatment facilities. It would only be through such reporting that the medical staffs could be prepared to treat mass casualties in the event of a terrorist attack or accident that resulted in a catastrophic release of those chemicals into the community.

BTW: Apparently PETA and other animal rights groups have still not noticed the animal testing provisions included in the bill.

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