On September 22, the House Resources Committee approved, by unanimous consent, a bill (H.R. 2440) to reauthorize the Indian Health Care Improvement Act (P.L. 94-437). The Senate Committee on Indian Affairs approved its version of the bill (S. 556) the same day. The Senate committee heard testimony on the reauthorization of the Indian Health Care Improvement Act on July 21 (see The Source, 7/23/04).
Sponsored by Rep. Don Young (R-AK) and Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R-CO), the bills would reauthorize through FY2015 programs under the Department of Health and Human Services’ Indian Health Service. They also would include a number of provisions specific to women’s health, including funding “to monitor and improve the quality of health care for Indian women of all ages.”
The measures would authorize the development of a comprehensive behavioral health prevention and treatment program that would encourage collaboration among alcohol and substance abuse, social services, and mental health programs. For children under the age of 17, behavioral health services would include the promotion of healthy choices with a focus on sexually transmitted diseases, domestic violence, sexual abuse, teen pregnancy, and obesity. For adults, behavioral health services would include the promotion of gender-specific healthy choices with a focus on parenting, domestic violence, and sexual assault.
The bills would authorize funding for the development of a comprehensive substance abuse program with a focus on “prevention, intervention, treatment, and relapse prevention services that specifically address the spiritual, cultural, historical, social, and child care needs of Indian women.” They also would authorize the establishment of a fetal alcohol disorder program “to identify and provide behavioral health treatment to high-risk Indian women and high-risk women pregnant with an Indian’s child.”
Under the bills, grants would be authorized for the prevention and treatment of child abuse. Grantees would be encouraged to develop prevention, training, and education programs for Urban Indians, and would provide outpatient treatment services to victims of child sexual abuse and their families.
Finally, the measures would authorize funding for mammography screening “for Indian women at a frequency appropriate to such women under national standards.”
In a press release announcing committee passage of the bill, Rep. Young stated, “I am pleased to move this legislation along in the process. This bill declares that it is the policy of the United States that the health status of American Indians and Alaska Natives should be raised by 2010 to the same level as is set for other Americans. This levels the playing field for American Indians and my Alaska Natives.”
