Title: To direct the Secretary of Health and Human Services, acting through the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, to develop a plan to improve surveillance with respect to diseases that are viral pandemic threats, and for other purposes.
Policy area: Health

Summary:
This bill requires the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to take specified actions related to surveillance of viral pandemic threats. Specifically, HHS must (1) award competitive, short-term grants to assess and optimize approaches to early detection of viral pandemic threats; and (2) report to Congress on the results of this program. The CDC must develop a plan to improve surveillance of viral pandemic threats that includes rapid detection and effective information sharing with respect to such diseases.

[Congressional Bills 116th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 6504 Introduced in House (IH)]

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116th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 6504

 To direct the Secretary of Health and Human Services, acting through 
  the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, to 
 develop a plan to improve surveillance with respect to diseases that 
          are viral pandemic threats, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             April 14, 2020

 Ms. Jackson Lee introduced the following bill; which was referred to 
                  the Committee on Energy and Commerce

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To direct the Secretary of Health and Human Services, acting through 
  the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, to 
 develop a plan to improve surveillance with respect to diseases that 
          are viral pandemic threats, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. IMPROVED SURVEILLANCE WITH RESPECT TO DISEASES THAT ARE 
              VIRAL PANDEMIC THREATS.

    (a) Plan.--Not later than 1 year after the date of enactment of 
this Act, the Secretary of Health and Human Services acting through the 
Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (in this 
section referred to as the ``Secretary'') shall develop a plan to 
improve surveillance with respect to diseases that are viral pandemic 
threats, so as to ensure--
            (1) rapid detection of the spread of such diseases;
            (2) effective sharing of surveillance information, subject 
        to privacy protections for individually identifiable 
        information under applicable law; and
            (3) rapid and coordinated response to such diseases by 
        Federal, State, Tribal, territorial, and local public health 
        agencies.
    (b) Pilot Program.--
            (1) In general.--The Secretary, in coordination with 
        development of the plan under subsection (a), shall carry out a 
        competitive pilot program in which the Secretary awards grant 
        to entities for projects--
                    (A) to assesses the state of early detection of 
                diseases that are viral pandemic threats to determine 
                the strengths and weaknesses of the current methods, 
                policies, and procedures for such early detection; and
                    (B) to optimize such early detection through 
                development and implementation of innovative approaches 
                to the development of rapid or instant tests, methods, 
                policies, and procedures over the 4-month period 
                following the date of enactment of this Act.
            (2) Announcement.--The Secretary shall announce that--
                    (A) applications for grants under this subsection 
                will be accepted for 60 days following the 
                announcement; and
                    (B) the grant recipients will be selected within 60 
                days of the end of the acceptance period described in 
                subparagraph (A).
            (3) Duration of projects.--The duration of a project funded 
        under this section shall not exceed 6 months unless the grant 
        recipient receives written approval from the Secretary for the 
        project to exceed 6 months.
            (4) Collaboration.--Grant recipients under this section may 
        not collaborate on projects funded under this section unless, 
        before approving the collaboration, the Secretary--
                    (A) determines that such collaboration will further 
                the objectives described in paragraph (1); and
                    (B) gives notice to the congressional committees of 
                jurisdiction that such collaboration will occur.
            (5) Reporting by grantees.--Not later than 3 months after 
        completing a project funded under this section, a grant 
        recipient shall submit a report to the Secretary on the results 
        of the project.
            (6) Report to congress.--Not later than 18 months after the 
        date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary shall submit a 
        report, including a classified annex, to the Congress on the 
        results of the pilot program under this subsection.
    (c) Authorization of Appropriations.--To carry out this section, 
there is authorized to be appropriated $30,000,000.
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