Full Bill Text

Vote Smart's Synopsis:

Vote to fund and expand programs related to Native American health care.

Highlights:

• Makes grants and educational scholarships available for the recruitment of Native Americans into health professions and for health professionals who serve Native American populations (Sec. 101).

• Authorizes the expenditure of funds for health promotion and disease prevention programs for Native Americans, including screening for diabetes, screening for cancers including breast cancer, monitoring of environmental and nuclear health hazards, and preventing communicable diseases (Sec. 101).

• Establishes an Office of Indian Men's Health within the Indian Health Service to promote health among Native American men (Sec. 101).

• Makes funds available for mental health, physical disease prevention, suicide prevention and intervention, and alcohol and drug abuse treatment programs that are aimed at Native American youth and urban Native American youth (Sec. 101).

• Establishes five health care delivery demonstration projects to test alternative means of delivering health care and services to Native Americans, and allows up to ten additional projects to be established each year (Sec. 101).

• Authorizes the expenditure of funds for the construction, renovation, and modernization of health care facilities, and allows tribes to use maintenance and improvement funds to build a replacement health facility if the renovation costs are too expensive (Sec. 101).

• Increases access of Native Americans to Medicare, Medicaid, and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) (Sec. 101).

• Directs the Secretary of Health and Human Services to conduct a study to determine the feasibility of treating the Navajo Nation as a state for the purposes of Medicaid delivery services (Sec. 101).

• Authorizes the expenditure of funds for the development a comprehensive behavioral health prevention and treatment program which emphasizes collaboration among alcohol and substance abuse, social services, and mental health programs (Sec. 101).

• Establishes programs to prevent and treat Native American victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse (Sec. 101).

• Prohibits any funds in this bill from being used to perform abortions, except in cases in which the pregnancy resulted from incest involving a minor or rape, or in cases in which an abortion is medically necessary to save a pregnant woman's life (Sec. 101).

• Apologizes to Native Americans, on behalf of the people of the United States, "for the many instances of violence, maltreatment, and neglect inflicted on Native Peoples by citizens of the United States" (Sec. 101).

Full Bill Text

Full Bill Text