Date: 2006-06-21
Speaker: GENE GREEN (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: Texas

Mr. Speaker. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker. I rise in support of the bill before us today. which will reauthorize the community health center program through 2011. Over the years. the health center program has gained tremendous support from Democrats and Republicans. the Congress. and the President. a claim that can be made by very few Federal programs. This support is due to the overwhelming impact that health centers have made on the health and wellbeing of our countrys most vulnerable populations. In 2005. health centers provided care to 6 million uninsured individuals who represented 40 percent of the patient population at health centers. Ninetyone percent of health center patients are low income. and 36 percent are Medicaid. Without a doubt. health centers. are meeting their mission for providing muchneeded health care to the medically . underserved in this country. Much of this success can be attributed to the core elements of section 330 of the statute we seek to reauthorize today. To be eligible for Federal funding. health centers must be located in medically underserved communities. they must have independent boards. a majority of which must be governed by members of the community who utilize the center for health care. and they must also provide compulsory. primary. and preventive health care with services available to all community residents regardless of the patients ability to pay. This focus on primary and preventive care has yielded tremendous savings for our health care system. as health centers provide the uninsured and underinsured with access to care that they would otherwise seek in our hospital emergency rooms. A study in Harris County. Houston. Texas. where my district lies. found that 57 percent of the emergency room visits could be handled at a primary care clinic. This is a perfect example of the type of health care problem that health centers help solve. Access to affordable primary care at health centers has also reduced. the need for inpatient and specialty care. Because of medical problems in health centers. patients are treated earlier before they require inhospital treatment. In fact. a study suggests that health centers saved Medicaid approximately 30 percent in annual spending on beneficiaries receiving care at our Nations health centers. This successful result is that health centers have become the medical home for more than. 15 million Americans. Health centers also represent the Nations largest primary care system. with one in nine Medicaid beneficiaries and one in five lowincome individuals receiving care at health centers. I. have a personal interest in this issue because we have been working for years in the Houston area to establish additional community health centers to serve our growing uninsured and underinsured population. My State of Texas. unfortunately. ranks number one in the number of uninsured and with 25 percent of Texans living without insurance. The. statistics for the Houston area are just as troubling. More than 30 percent of Harris County residents are living without health insurance. Despite the obvious need for additional health centers in the Houston area. we have been playing catchup for quite a while. Last year. our area was awarded five additional FQHCs. federally qualified health centers. bringing our total to nine sites. including lookalike centers. With more than 1 million uninsured. however. the Houston area will still have fewer than 10 FQHCs. while other large cities. like Chicago. have more than 70 sites. In the Houston area we know our work is not done. As a Nation we have a long way to go before we meet the Presidents goal of locating health centers in every lowincome county in this country. In fact. studies suggest there are still more than 900 poor counties in the U.S. in need of a health center. To ensure that these goals are met. it is crucial that we pass this bill to reauthorize the health center program. whose current authorization expires this year.