Ripon Advance: Garbarino, GOP colleagues call for committee markup of 9/11 health funding bill

U.S. Rep. Andrew Garbarino (R-NY) led 11 Republicans, including the entire New York GOP congressional delegation, in urging U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee leadership to mark up bipartisan legislation that would ensure sufficient funding for the World Trade Center Health Program (WTCHP).

Specifically, the members want the committee to consider the 9/11 Responder and Survivor Health Funding Correction Act, H.R. 4965, which Rep. Garbarino and U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) introduced in August 2021 with 38 other original cosponsors. While referred at that time to the House E&C Commerce Committee for consideration, the bill has not yet been marked up.

“Congress should expeditiously move towards solidifying the WTCHP, so all the men and women who responded to and survived the September 11th terrorist attacks will continue to have the health coverage that they deserve,” Rep. Garbarino and his colleagues wrote in a July 8 letter sent to E&C Committee Chairman Frank Pallone (D-NJ).

Currently, the WTCHP provides medical treatment and monitoring for more than 100,000 responders and survivors from the World Trade Center and lower Manhattan, the Pentagon, and the Shanksville, Pa., crash site, according to the members’ letter, which was signed by lawmakers including U.S. Reps. John Katko (R-NY), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), Dave Joyce (R-OH), and Rodney Davis (R-IL). 

While Congress extended the program to 2090, the rise in medical costs and in cancer rates over the last three years have led the program to project a deficit in funding as soon as 2025, they wrote, noting that if Congress fails to act, the program will have to reduce spending and bar any new sick responders or survivors by October 2024.

“Let us be clear, if Congress does not quickly address this impending crisis, then the men and women who put their lives on the line and who survived the 9/11 terrorist attacks will lose health coverage to treat the physical and mental illnesses that they sustained from responding to the 9/11 terrorist attacks,” wrote Rep. Garbarino and his colleagues.