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Rep. Waxman made this statement on the floor of the House of Representatives during debate over whether to pass the AIDS Prevention Act of 1990, which later became known as the Ryan White CARE Act of 1990.

AIDS PREVENTION ACT OF 1990
June 13, 1990

The Congressional Record

By Henry A. Waxman
(Extension of Remarks)

Mr. WAXMAN. Mr. Chairman, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Mr. Chairman and my colleagues, some people speak about the AIDS epidemic as if the whole epidemic were over, as if it was a problem only in the 1980's. AIDS is not over. We have, in fact, seen only the beginning.

Mr. Chairman, having missed our opportunity to provide an ounce of prevention, we must now prepare to pay for pounds and pounds of cure. There have been over 130,000 cases of AIDS reported in the United States among adults and children. The Centers for Disease Control estimates that there are a million Americans infected and that 20 percent of these people are very close to becoming sick, and we have no plan to deal with these health care needs. Hospitals and community care providers are overwhelmed. Voluntary organizations and charities are strained to the breaking point.

Mr. Chairman, Surgeon General Koop, who testified before our subcommittee this year, indicated that in his opinion we had no plan for dealing with these problems despite all of his efforts and all of ours. This bill today takes an important first step.

Mr. Chairman, the AIDS Prevention Act of 1990 is a bill to provide for health care services in response to the AIDS epidemic in the United States. It authorizes funds for services for prevention, both for preventing infection among the uninfected and preventing disease among those already infected. It also authorizes funds for health and support services for people who are ill and for emergency assistance to those cities that are hardest hit by the epidemic.

These measures are long overdue:

Many of our public health clinics that are trying to control such problems as drug abuse or tuberculosis are being asked to provide AIDS services as well, with no additional funding. The result can only be an erosion of these clinics' primary services.

Many of our AIDS counseling and testing programs have no financing for the provision of early intervention health care. The result can only be incomplete prevention programs that serve no one well.

Many of our hospitals are struggling with the tidal wave of acute cases of AIDS coming into their emergency rooms and admitting offices and have no place to serve these people on an outpatient basis or after their hospitalization. The result can only be overcrowding and a diminished level of care.

Such inadequacies are in no one's interest. The system does not adequately prevent infection among the uninfected, prevent disease among the infected, or provide care for the sick. And the system concentrates its care at the most expensive point--acute care for persons who are desperately ill.

This bill will take first steps to remedy these inadequacies.

It will provide for a continuum of prevention services--counseling and testing, diagnostics for those who test positive, and therapeutics for those whose diagnostics indicate a medical intervention.

It will provide emergency relief for those cities that have been hardest hit by the epidemic.

And it will provide ongoing demonstration projects for the provision of comprehensive care to people who are ill.

The bill was reported by a unanimous vote, both from the Subcommittee on Health and the Environment and from the Committee on Energy and Commerce. I anticipate no serious opposition to its passage.

Mr. Chairman, we will have some amendments, which I will discuss at the appropriate time, over which there is controversy, but, when we get to the final passage of the bill, I expect that this bill will pass easily.

I want to thank the Members and the staff from both sides of the aisle for their help in moving this legislation so quickly and so smoothly.

A number of difficult issues have been resolved, Mr. Chairman, and I think these efforts will be rewarded with a bill that all Members can vote for and be proud of, and I urge support for the bill.

Mr. Chairman, I reserve the balance of my time.