[Congressional Record Volume 169, Number 48 (Wednesday, March 15, 2023)]
[Senate]
[Pages S800-S802]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
STATEMENTS ON INTRODUCED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS
By Mr. KAINE (for himself, Mr. Markey, Ms. Duckworth, Mr.
Blumenthal, Ms. Smith, Mr. Padilla, Mr. Whitehouse, Ms.
Stabenow, Mr. Reed, Ms. Klobuchar, and Mr. King):
S. 801. A bill to address research on, and improve access
to, supportive services for individuals with Long COVID; to
the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
Mr. KAINE. Madam President, I rise today to talk about the importance
of March 15, which for the first time has been designated
``International Long COVID Awareness Day.''
This is a topic of importance to millions of Americans who deal with
long COVID every day and tens of millions of people around the world
who are dealing with long COVID, from mild symptoms to symptoms that
are so debilitating that they are unable to work.
There is still an awful lot to learn about the condition, but what we
do know is that long COVID is comprised of ongoing health problems that
people experience after being infected with COVID-19. For some, long
COVID can last weeks or months. For others, like me, long COVID has now
lasted for 3 years.
Long COVID symptoms can vary. Some people experience general symptoms
like fatigue, neurological symptoms like headache or difficulty
concentrating, digestive problems, shortness of breath, heart
palpitations, and other neurological conditions.
The prevalence of long COVID is a best estimate, but the recent
survey by the Census Bureau, in partnership with the National Center
for Health Statistics, shows that about 5.8 percent of Americans have
long COVID, and that amounts to about 11 percent of Americans who have
had COVID who continue to experience long COVID symptoms.
I am on my own long COVID journey. My symptoms are mild, but they
have been continuous for 3 years. When we were working in the Capitol
in March of 2020 at the very beginning of COVID, most of us had
dispatched our staffs and sent them home. So I was working in my office
together just with my chief of staff. It was kind of a lonely time, as
those of us who were here remember, but we were working hard. We were
working hard to pass the first COVID relief bill, the CARES Act, and we
did good work, in a bipartisan way, to provide relief to individuals
and our businesses and hospitals and universities and schools in those
early days.
I noticed one day that my nerve endings turned on like a light switch
was flicked, and all of them started to tingle like my skin had been
dipped in an Alka-Seltzer--24/7, every nerve ending in my body. It has
not gone away in 3 years.
I had a mild case of COVID. I never had respiratory problems. I never
had fatigue. Within a few days after getting this, I was fine except
for the nerve tingling, and I assumed because of the pollen on my car
that it was hay fever gone wild. Other symptoms were more like allergic
symptoms--pinkeye and skin rashes.
That all went away, but when I went home, I gave COVID to my wife--
just one more thing for a husband to feel guilty about. She got the
standard case of COVID, and that is what made us realize that that is
what I had. We both had mild cases. Within a very few days, we were up
and at `em and feeling great, but this nerve tingling sensation has
never gone away.
I kept waiting, thinking next week it will go away or next month it
will go away, but after 6 months, I finally decided I should see a
neurologist. I went
[[Page S801]]
to George Washington and did fine on neurological tests, but the
neurologist told me: Look, viruses can have a neurological aftereffect.
The good news is, it is probably not going to get worse. The bad news
is, it may not get better.
The doctor was perfectly right on both counts. It has never gotten
worse, and it has never gotten better. It is not painful. It is not
debilitating. I can work. I can exercise. I can focus. It is harder to
sleep--that would be the only area where it is affecting my life. But
it is eerie that, after 3 years, it hasn't changed.
My wife said: Well, but then doesn't that mean you just get used to
it and you don't notice it?
No. It is just a little too intense. I notice it all the time,
everywhere.
Well, the good news is, my symptoms are mild and I can continue to
work, but as I have shared my story, what I have found is many come and
share their stories with me, including people here around the Capitol.
They share their own long COVID stories, and many are very, very
troubling: The marathon runner who can't walk around the block. I have
a dear friend who--I am godfather to her oldest child--has a very
physically demanding job as a dialysis nurse, which involves a lot of
helping patients around. She got COVID, and both fatigue and balance
issues are so challenging that she is not able to do the work.
I had a State employee who worked in my department of transportation
who saw me on a bike ride by his house one day in Richmond, where I
live, and he flagged me down and stopped me. He said: Hey, look, I was
your employee when you were Governor working with the department of
transportation. I am a young dad. I have two boys under age 10. I want
to be a great father for them, but I got COVID, and now my long COVID
symptoms are so significant, I can't play baseball with them.
He can't do the kinds of things that a dad wants to do with his
children. This individual is now on long-term disability, unable to
work at all.
These are very, very serious stories.
The public health emergency around COVID is likely to come to an end
on May 11, but we can't forget millions of people who are dealing with
this issue.
Now, let me just share some statistics. Across the United States,
adult women are more likely than men to experience long COVID.
Individuals who identify as Hispanic or Latino experience long COVID
more than any other racial or ethnic group. People with disabilities
are more likely to experience long COVID than those without
disabilities.
Long COVID is not limited to people like me. I just turned 65. A lot
of young people are dealing with long COVID symptoms. Their initial
COVID presented differently than it did with most adults, but some of
the long COVID symptoms are those I have described. Twenty-five percent
of people who have long COVID say that their symptoms significantly
limit their activity.
The economic cost of long COVID disability is upward of $200 billion
a year. Up to 4 million people are out of the American workforce right
now because of long COVID, at a time when I know all of us are hearing
from our employers: I can't hire people. It is so hard to hire people
now.
The unemployment rate is the lowest it has been since 1969. If there
are things we could do that could help those 4 million come back into
the workforce, it would be good not only for them, for their happiness,
for their pocketbooks; it would be great for our economy.
To better understand the impact of long COVID, in January, I worked
together with the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality to gather
patients and providers from Virginia and State and Federal officials
from everywhere to come to a summit in Richmond to talk about long
COVID. The conversations that day allowed us to, nearly 3 years in, dig
into long COVID and what are its impacts and, most importantly, what
can we do. We were able to discuss experiences, share best practices
and research.
I was honored to have four Virginians with long COVID who joined me
in discussing their own journeys.
Cynthia talked about having unusual symptoms and not being believed
initially that she even had COVID and then not being believed that she
had long COVID. Her symptoms were more in the allergic reaction space,
similar to mine. In fact, she went multiple times to emergency rooms
because her symptoms were so intense and found that, without telling
her, she was often being drug-tested because they assumed that she was
there and maybe she was suffering from some kind of a drug overdose. So
they were testing her for that and not believing her long COVID story.
She has since found healthcare professionals who believe her and are
offering her treatments that have not ended her long COVID symptoms but
are enabling her to more effectively negotiate her schedule.
Mattie from Southwest Virginia was kind of your quintessential do-
everything, 35-year-old mom of three, who also worked, who also went to
school. She could juggle everything and make it seem easy. When she got
COVID, she got hit with fatigue so intense she couldn't do any of those
things, and then that spiraled into depression. She was a healthcare
provider herself, working with seniors, and really started to question,
What kind of purpose do I have if I can't be the mom I want to be, if I
can't be the healthcare provider I want to be? It caused tremendous
anxiety and depression.
Now, Mattie's was a story of hope because she eventually found a
physician who realized COVID had exacerbated an underlying medical
condition called Hashimoto's disease that she had had probably since
birth but had never really been serious enough to notice. COVID
exacerbated it. She is being treated for Hashimoto's, and many of those
symptoms have abated. So hers is a story of hope. This is not a
hopelessness story. You can find paths forward. She is doing better.
ZZ and Katy. ZZ is a middle schooler who had serious long COVID
experiences, and Katy talked about trying to help her son and not being
believed until they finally found their way to the Children's National
Hospital, just up the hill from where we are.
Finally, Rachel--a longtime human resources professional at a
community college in Virginia--used to working with people, including
people with disabilities, to help them either get jobs or do coursework
at the local community college. Her long COVID experience was so
debilitating in fatigue and migraine headaches and other problems with
respect to focus that she eventually had to leave her job and apply for
long-term disability and her Social Security.
She was told when she applied that there were more than half a
million applications before hers, and after a year, she was turned down
with little explanation. She described the challenges of trying to
negotiate the system and fill out forms when she is suffering from such
fatigue and headaches and other symptoms that make even filling out a
form difficult.
So these four stories were a mixture of young people and adults, some
stories that didn't yet have happy endings and at least one that did
have a positive ending, and it was important that we understand them.
Congress has taken some steps. I have colleagues in the room, and I
just want to thank them for this. We provided $1.15 billion in Federal
funding to the National Institutes of Health to advance understanding,
prevention, and treatment. In December, Congress passed a budget that
included $10 million for this Agency for Healthcare Research and
Quality to do critical research. These efforts are a step in the right
direction, but more must be done.
Just last week, the President introduced the fiscal year 2024 budget.
He requested additional funding for AHRQ and additional funding for the
HSRA to do long COVID.
Today, I am reintroducing a bill, the CARE for Long COVID Act, with
Senators Markey and Duckworth and eight other Senators. It is also
being introduced in a bipartisan way on the House side. The bill will
expand research to increase understanding of treatment efficacy and
disparities and provide more recommendations, educate long COVID
patients and health providers, facilitate interagency cooperation, and
develop partnerships between community-based organizations, social
services, and others.
But there is more work to be done, so as I conclude--I see my
colleague from Louisiana on the floor waiting to
[[Page S802]]
speak--we just have to keep focused on this to try to address this
challenge. When the public health emergency ends, we can't forget those
who are dealing with long COVID, and we can't forget those who are
dealing with the significant amount of mental anxiety and stress that
has been present in the lives of all for the last 3 years. We have to
improve our outreach and education, we have to accelerate our research
to come up with treatments and cures that work, and we have to do it
with a sense of urgency. I am committed to working with you all to do
that.
______
By Mr. THUNE:
S. 808. A bill to amend the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003
to require the Secretary of Agriculture to expedite hazardous fuel or
insect and disease risk reduction projects on certain National Forest
System land, and for other purposes; to the Committee on Agriculture,
Nutrition, and Forestry.
Mr. THUNE. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of
the bill be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the text of the bill was ordered to be
printed in the Record, as follows:
S. 808
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Expediting Forest
Restoration and Recovery Act of 2023''.
SEC. 2. APPLICATION BY FOREST SERVICE OF AUTHORITIES TO
EXPEDITE ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSES IN CARRYING OUT
HAZARDOUS FUEL AND INSECT AND DISEASE RISK
REDUCTION PROJECTS.
Section 104 of the Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003
(16 U.S.C. 6514) is amended by adding at the end the
following:
``(i) Application by Forest Service of Authorities To
Expedite Environmental Analyses in Carrying Out Hazardous
Fuel and Insect and Disease Risk Reduction Projects.--
``(1) Definitions.--In this subsection:
``(A) Insect and disease treatment area.--The term `insect
and disease treatment area' means an area that--
``(i) is designated by the Secretary as an insect and
disease treatment area under this title; or
``(ii) is designated as at risk or a hazard on the most
recent National Insect and Disease Risk Map published by the
Forest Service.
``(B) Secretary.--The term `Secretary' has the meaning
given the term in section 101(14)(A).
``(2) Use of authorities.--In carrying out a hazardous fuel
or insect and disease risk reduction project in an insect and
disease treatment area authorized under this Act, the
Secretary shall--
``(A) apply the categorical exclusion established by
section 603 in the case of a hazardous fuel or insect and
disease risk reduction project carried out in an area--
``(i) designated as suitable for timber production within
the applicable forest plan; or
``(ii) where timber harvest activities are not prohibited;
``(B) conduct applicable environmental assessments and
environmental impact statements in accordance with this
section in the case of a hazardous fuel or insect and disease
risk reduction project--
``(i) carried out in an area--
``(I) outside of an area described in subparagraph (A); or
``(II) where other significant resource concerns exist, as
determined exclusively by the Secretary; or
``(ii) that is carried out in an area equivalent to not
less than a hydrologic unit code 5 watershed, as defined by
the United States Geological Survey; and
``(C) notwithstanding subsection (d), in the case of any
other hazardous fuel or insect and disease risk reduction
project, in the environmental assessment or environmental
impact statement prepared under subsection (b), study,
develop, and describe--
``(i) the proposed agency action; and
``(ii) the alternative of no action.
``(3) Priority for reducing risks of insect infestation and
wildfire.--Except where established as a mandatory standard
that constrains project and activity decision making in a
resource management plan (as defined in section 101(13)(A))
in effect on the date of enactment of this Act, in the case
of an insect and disease treatment area, the Secretary shall
prioritize reducing the risks of insect and disease
infestation and wildfire over other planning objectives.
``(4) Inclusion of fire regime group iv.--Notwithstanding
section 603(c)(2)(B), the Secretary shall apply the
categorical exclusion described in paragraph (2)(A) to areas
in Fire Regime Group IV.
``(5) Excluded areas.--This subsection shall not apply to--
``(A) a component of the National Wilderness Preservation
System; or
``(B) an inventoried roadless area, except in the case of
an activity that is permitted under--
``(i) the final rule of the Secretary entitled `Special
Areas; Roadless Area Conservation' (66 Fed. Reg. 3244
(January 12, 2001)); or
``(ii) a State-specific roadless area conservation rule.
``(6) Reports.--The Secretary shall annually make publicly
available data describing the acreage treated under hazardous
fuel or insect and disease risk reduction projects in insect
and disease treatment areas during the previous year.''.
SEC. 3. GOOD NEIGHBOR AUTHORITY.
Section 8206(b)(2) of the Agricultural Act of 2014 (16
U.S.C. 2113a(b)(2)) is amended by striking subparagraph (C)
and inserting the following:
``(C) Treatment of revenue.--Funds received from the sale
of timber by a Governor of a State under a good neighbor
agreement shall be retained and used by the Governor--
``(i) to carry out authorized restoration services under
that good neighbor agreement; and
``(ii) if funds remain after carrying out authorized
restoration services under clause (i), to carry out
authorized restoration services within the State under other
good neighbor agreements.''.
______
By Mr. DURBIN (for himself and Mrs. Shaheen):
S. 814. A bill to allow the Secretary of Homeland Security to
designate Romania as a program country under the visa waiver program;
to the Committee on the Judiciary.
Mr. DURBIN. Madam President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of
the bill be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the text of the bill was ordered to be
printed in the Record, as follows:
S. 814
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Romania Visa Waiver Act of
2023''.
SEC. 2. SENSE OF CONGRESS.
It is the sense of Congress that the Government of Romania
should--
(1) undertake all steps necessary to prepare Romania for
participation in the visa waiver program under section 217 of
the Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1187) by
developing a strategy to meet all criteria for the program;
and
(2) continue to advance robust efforts to eliminate
trafficking in persons, including by prioritizing the
recommendations outlined in the report of the Department of
State entitled ``Trafficking in Persons Report'' issued in
July 2022.
SEC. 3. ELIGIBILITY OF ROMANIA FOR VISA WAIVER PROGRAM.
Notwithstanding any provision of section 217 of the
Immigration and Nationality Act (8 U.S.C. 1187), the
Secretary of Homeland Security may designate Romania as a
program country under the visa waiver program established by
that section.
____________________