March 27, 2023 – At the end of 2022, HIDA achieved multiple legislative wins to strengthen the medical supply chain. These provisions are a victory for patients and providers, and are the result of several years of advocacy by our association and our member companies.
In April 2020, Representatives Debbie Dingell (D-MI) and Jackie Walorski (R-IN) introduced the Medical Supplies for Pandemics Act. This bipartisan legislation would create incentives to geographically diversify production of medical supplies and maintain domestic reserves of critical medical supplies like personal protective equipment and diagnostic tests. Over the next two years, the Medical Supplies for Pandemics Act was passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on five separate occasions. Despite having bipartisan companion legislation – led by Senators Thom Tillis (R-NC) and Michael Bennet (D-CO), it was never considered by the Senate.
However, HIDA and its members stayed engaged with Senate staff regarding the legislation and we were able to get these provisions included in broader preparedness legislation. HIDA worked with the Senate Health Education Labor & Pensions (HELP) Committee and successfully included the Medical Supplies for Pandemics Act into the text of the PREVENT Pandemics Act. This text was approved by a HELP Committee markup of the legislation in March 2022.
Meanwhile, HIDA’s members in the laboratory services space were facing reimbursement cuts of up to 15% for many common laboratory diagnostic services, cuts which threatened to reduce patient access to diagnostics. Senators Richard Burr (R-NC) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) introduced the Saving Access to Laboratory Services Act (SALSA), which would restructure the data collection process and limit cuts to a reasonable and sustainable range.
Read more in the latest issue of Repertoire Magazine.