Medical Nutrition Equity Act of 2021 This bill expands coverage under Medicare, Medicaid, other specified federal health care programs, and private health insurance to include foods, vitamins, and individual amino acids that are medically necessary for the management of certain digestive and metabolic disorders and conditions.
COVID-19 Vaccine Developers Gold Medal Act This bill provides for the award of a Congressional Gold Medal to recognize all those whose efforts led to the development of COVID-19 vaccines that received emergency use authorizations.
Ending the Diagnostic Odyssey Act of 2021 This bill allows state Medicaid programs to cover whole genome sequencing services for certain individuals. Specifically, states may cover such services for individuals under the age of 21 (or a lower age, if the state chooses) and for former foster youth under the age of 26 who (1) have been referred or admitted to an intensive care unit or seen by a medical specialist for a suspected genetic or undiagnosed disease, or (2) are suspected by a medical specialist to have a neonatal- or pediatric-onset genetic disease. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services may award grants to assist states in developing plans to cover such services.
Downwinders Parity Act of 2021 This bill expands a program that compensates individuals who were exposed to radiation from atmospheric nuclear testing and subsequently developed specified cancers. Under current law, the program compensates, among others, individuals who were present in a designated geographic area during a period of nuclear testing. The bill expands that area to include all parts of Clark County, Nevada, and Mohave County, Arizona. Current law restricts eligibility to certain parts of those counties. The Department of Justice must report on efforts to inform individuals newly eligible for compensation about the program.
Afghan Allies Protection Act of 2021 This bill modifies a program providing special immigrant visas to eligible citizens or nationals of Afghanistan who assisted U.S. efforts there and addresses related issues. The bill extends the program through 2023 and increases the number of visas available. An individual may become eligible for a visa after assisting U.S. efforts in Afghanistan for one year, whereas currently some individuals must have served for two years. Furthermore, for an applicant qualifying for a visa by performing duties with a NATO mission in Afghanistan, the bill eliminates a requirement that the duties performed qualify as sensitive and trusted duties. The bill removes a requirement that the individual has experienced or is facing an ongoing serious threat due to their assistance to the United States or NATO. The Department of State or the Department of Homeland Security may postpone the program's medical examination requirement. An individual who received a postponement must undergo a medical exam within 90 days of admission into the United States. The bill also expands surviving family member benefits for the Afghanistan program (and a similar program for Iraq) to a surviving spouse or child of an individual who submitted an application to the Chief of Mission that would have been approved but for the individual's death. Currently, such survivor benefits only apply if the deceased individual's petition was approved.
Patient Access to ESRD New Innovative Devices Act This bill requires the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to provide a certain payment adjustment under the Medicare end-stage renal disease (ESRD) prospective payment system. Specifically, the CMS must provide for a three-year temporary add-on payment adjustment for new medical devices used to diagnose, treat, or manage ESRD. (CMS regulations currently provide a two-year temporary add-on payment adjustment.)
Pipeline and LNG Facility Cybersecurity Preparedness Act This bill requires the Department of Energy to implement a program to ensure the security, resiliency, and survivability of natural gas pipelines, hazardous liquid pipelines, and liquefied natural gas facilities.
Protecting Rural Telehealth Access Act This bill expands coverage of telehealth services under Medicare. Specifically, the bill permanently (1) removes geographic restrictions on originating sites (i.e., the location of the beneficiary), (2) allows the home of the beneficiary to serve as the originating site for all services, (3) allows federally qualified health centers and rural health clinics to serve as the distant site (i.e., the location of the health care practitioner), and (4) expands coverage to include audio-only services for evaluation and management and behavioral health services.
Multiple Substance Impaired Driving Prevention Act of 2021 This bill includes substances other than alcohol within the scope of federal programs for preventing impaired driving. It also addresses reporting of impaired driving arrests, citations, convictions, and related matters to federal and other databases. Under current law, if a state does not have (or enforce) certain laws to address repeat intoxicated drivers, a portion of that state's Federal-aid highway funding must be reserved for alcohol-related countermeasures for impaired driving. This bill provides that reserved funds may also be used for countermeasures for single or multiple substance impaired driving. Additionally, states may use grants for impaired driving countermeasures to improve (1) reporting of information about crashes and impaired driving to federal, state, and local databases; and (2) research using such information. The Government Accountability Office must also study the extent to which states and localities report information about impaired driving to relevant federal databases and use the databases to identify repeat impaired driving offenders.
Stronger Communities through Better Transit Act This bill requires the Department of Transportation to establish a grant program to support operating projects for public transportation (e.g., service expansion) and related capital improvements, particularly in underserved communities and areas of persistent poverty.
Physical Therapist Workforce and Patient Access Act of 2021 This bill makes physical therapists eligible for the National Health Service Corps Loan Repayment Program. This program assists primary care, mental health, and dental providers in repaying eligible student loans in exchange for working in areas with shortages of such providers.
Accountable Care in Rural America Act This bill requires the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to exclude certain components from a methodology used under the Medicare Shared Savings Program. The program enables accountable care organizations (ACOs) to receive payments for savings stemming from care coordination and management. Specifically, the bill requires the CMS to exclude an ACO's assigned Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries from certain regional adjustments to the ACO's benchmark for savings determinations, and to otherwise ensure that an ACO is not in a less favorable financial position due to its share of assigned beneficiaries in the region.
