July 20, 2006

Senate Appropriations Increases HHS Funding;
House Bill Still Stalled

In a unanimous roll-call vote July 20, 2006, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved a $606 billion bill for Labor/HHS/Education that would provide almost $143 billion in discretionary spending for these domestic programs, a one percent increase over current levels and $5 billion more than the president's budget request. However, funding still falls $7 billion short of FY 2005 levels--$7 billion dollars that the Senate had hoped to recover and overwhelmingly supported through an amendment to the Budget Resolution in March.

The Senate Appropriations Committee initiated its own bill since the House has not yet taken action on the appropriations reported by the House Appropriations Committee (H.R. 5647). Labor/HHS/Education is the last appropriations bill awaiting action by the full House; House Majority Leader John Boehner does not intend to bring the bill to the floor before the August recess.

The Senate essentially provides flat funding for agencies that support health services research and is generally consistent with the House bill. According to the committee report as it appeared before amendments were adopted on Thursday :

- AHRQ would receive flat funding of nearly $319 million, including $84 million for "determining ways to reduce medical errors" (which includes $50 million for HIT) and $15 million for comparative effectiveness research. The Coalition requested $440 million for the agency, $100 million for patient safety, $60 million for comparative effectiveness research, and $60 million for HIT.

- CDC would receive a total of $6.2 billion, of which $31 million is provided for public health research, consistent with the Coalition's recommendation. The National Center for Health Statistics would be virtually flat funded at $109 million. Unlike the House bill, the Senate bill does not include an additional $400,000 more than FY 2006 funding to conduct a feasibility project on linking the state-based food assistance program records to the NHANES database. The Coalition recommended $139 million for NCHS.

- NIH would receive $28.5 billion; $220 million more than current levels, $250 million more than provided in the bill passed by the House appropriations committee, and $200 million more than the budget request. Assuming the proportion of funds invested in health services research remains consistent at 3.21 percent of total funding, we would expect to see an increase in HSR funding to $915 million; $7 million over the current estimate. The Coalition recommended a share of $961 million for health services research.

- CMS would receive $57 million in discretionary funding for research, demonstrations, and evaluations under the Senate bill, which is almost $16 million and $10 million more than the budget request and House recommendation, respectively. However, this $10 million increase in funding over the House level is directed to the Real Choice grants program to states and is not available for discretionary R&D. The Coalition recommended $88 million.

For a copy of the committee's press release visit appropriations.senate.gov/hearmarkups/LaborHPRFull07.mht

Also on Thursday, the Senate appropriations committee approved the military and veterans' affairs bill referred by the House. Funding for the Veterans Health Administration's research function is $412 million. The Coalition requested $460.

For a side by side comparison of the budget request and the House and Senate appropriations for agencies supporting health services research, please click here.

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