|
By GIFF JOHNSON
The US Senate Appropriations
Committee last week approved $1 million for the 177 Health
Program — the first indication of US Congressional support
to continue funding to the program since the money expired
with the end of the first Compact in September 2003.
The Senate proposal for
fiscal year 2005 includes specific eligibility requirements,
limiting it to islanders from the four nuclear affected
atolls who were born before 1960 and are living on those
islands and do not have other medical services available.
The measure must still be
approved by the full Senate, but Senate staff member Allen
Stayman, who was the US Compact negotiator from 1999 to
2001, told the Journal passage by the full Senate is nearly
a certainty.
The House of Representatives, however, did not put any
funding in its proposed FY 2005 budget, so the matter has to
go a conference committee to gain agreement.
Stayman said he hopes that
the conference with the House will happen within the next
two weeks because otherwise there will be a “delay for at
least another month in order to accommodate the election
recess.”
RMI officials have been
pushing both House and Senate members to address the need to
continue funding for the 177 Health Program.
According to the Senate
Appropriations Committee language, the $1 million “shall be
used to ensure continued medical programs and services to
members of the Enewetak, Bikini, Rongelap and Utrik
communities, born prior to 1960, who currently reside on
islands such as Enewetak, Kili, Mejatto and Utrik that do
not have medical services available.”
Currently, the 177 Health
Plan serves more than an estimated 14,000 people, with few
restrictions. |
