The House Appropriations Committee just released the bill report for the Fiscal Year 2022 (FY22) Labor, Health and Human Services, Education & Related Agencies (Labor-HHS) appropriations legislation with significant proposed increases for several programs to improve maternal and child health. AMCHP government affairs staff are digging into the details, but we wanted to share the bill resources for your reference, a few quick highlights, and some notes on next steps.

Resources on the House FY22 Labor-HHS appropriations legislation:

1. Bill text;
2. Bill report, which has the greatest level of detail; and
3. Bill summary from the House Appropriations Committee

Quick highlights:

• Proposes $868.7 million for HRSA’s Title V Maternal and Child Health (MCH) Block Grant! This would be a $156 million increase above the FY21 funding level of $712.7 million (21.8% increase);
• Of the $156 million proposed increase to the Title V MCH Block Grant, it looks like $29M would be directed to state formula funding and $127M would be directed to Special Projects of Regional and National Significance (SPRANS);
• The $127 million proposed increase to SPRANS includes dedicated funding for several programs – some existing and some new – explicitly focused on improving maternal health and eliminating inequities in maternal health outcomes, including:
  • $53 million for the State Maternal Health Innovation grant program ($30 million increase);
  • $25 million for a pregnancy medical home demonstration (NEW funding);
  • $14.3 million for the Alliance for Innovation on Maternal Health grant program ($5.3 million increase);
  • $5 million for grants to train health care providers on identifying and avoiding implicit bias (NEW funding);
  • $1 million for a National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) study on incorporating bias recognition in clinical skills testing for schools of medicine (NEW funding)
  • $2 million to support group prenatal and postpartum care programs (NEW funding); and more!;
• Proposes $119 million for CDC’s Safe Motherhood and Infant Health funding line, which would be an increase of $56 million above the FY21 funding level of $63 million (88.9% increase).

Next steps:

1. The full Appropriations Committee will mark up (i.e., consider and vote on) the Labor-HHS bill tomorrow at 10am ET. You can watch the mark-up via livestream.
2. There are still many more steps in this process in both the House and Senate before the appropriations legislation becomes law. This House bill is really the opening salvo of congressional appropriations negotiations. That being said, this is a great first step for programs to improve MCH and an excellent negotiating stance for these programs to see increases in the final FY22 bill.
3. Expect more activity on the House and Senate appropriations bills this month, but we likely won’t see final FY22 appropriations legislation until well into Fall 2021. That means we’ll likely need a continuing resolution (or “CR”) before the end of the current fiscal year on Sept. 30, 2021 to give Congress more time to finalize and pass the FY22 bills.