Nurturing and Supporting Healthy Babies Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. BARR. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Kentucky (Mr. Guthrie) for his leadership on this issue, and I want to thank my colleague from West Virginia (Mr. Jenkins) for his leadership on this important legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to encourage my colleagues to support his bill, H.R. 4978, the NAS Healthy Babies Act, which seeks to increase our understanding of neonatal abstinence syndrome and would help further strengthen best practices for treating this dangerous but preventable condition.

According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, there has been a dramatic increase in maternal opioid use; and as a tragic result, a baby is born suffering from neonatal abstinence syndrome, or NAS, every 25 minutes in the United States.

To help address this public health challenge, this legislation contains language drafted in coordination with my constituent, University of Kentucky pediatrician, Dr. Henrietta Bada-Ellzey, and members of the Sixth Congressional District Drug Abuse Task Force. Specifically, this provision would mandate a study which would gain critical data about the specific treatment options given to newborns with NAS during and after their hospital stay and identify treatment outcomes. This vital information would help lead pediatricians to provide improved care for the most vulnerable in our society.

I would like to thank the leader's office and the Energy and Commerce Committee staff for giving me an opportunity to include this important recommendation from the Sixth Congressional District Drug Abuse Task Force in this legislation. The opioid heroin crisis in America impacts every congressional district, and my district is not immune. So I am proud that the people's House is taking up a series of important measures to combat this scourge in our society, and I can't think of any more important measure than dealing with these innocent victims of NAS. General Leave

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