Press Releases

Congressman Morgan Griffith (R-VA) issued the following statement after the House Energy and Commerce Committee passed bills to support maternal health care and expand broadband coverage:

“This week, the Energy and Commerce Committee advanced several bills that have the potential to make a positive impact on residents of Virginia’s Ninth Congressional District. They seek to address some of the unique challenges faced by rural and isolated areas, including poorer health outcomes for new mothers and lack of access to broadband. I was pleased to work on a bipartisan basis with my colleagues to move forward on these priorities, and I will continue to advocate for them to become law.”

Background

The bills advanced by the Energy and Commerce Committee include:

H.R. 4995, the Maternal Health Quality Improvement Act, combines two bipartisan bills. The Rural MOMS Act provides funding for the Health Resources and Services Administration to establish rural obstetric networks to improve outcomes in birth and maternal mortality. The Excellence in Maternal Health Act authorizes grants to develop and promote best practices, support training, and operate evidence-based programs in the delivery of health care services to pregnant and postpartum women;

H.R. 4996, the Helping MOMS Act, would improve coverage for pregnant and postpartum women enrolled in Medicaid or the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) by giving states the option of covering these women for a year instead of 60 days;

H.R.4227, the Mapping Accuracy Promotes Services Act, would prohibit the submission to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) of broadband internet access service coverage information or data for the purposes of compiling an inaccurate broadband coverage map; and

H.R. 4229, the Broadband Deployment Accuracy and Technological Availability Act (Broadband DATA) Act, would require the FCC to issue rules relating to the collection of data with respect to the availability of broadband services.

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