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[Page: E2178]  GPO's PDF
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• Mrs. CAPPS. Mr. Speaker, today I support the National Campaign for Hearing Health. The campaign was launched a year and a half ago by the Deafness Research Foundation to put hearing health on the national agenda. With 28 million Americans suffering from hearing loss--from newborns to senior citizens--they are committed to promoting research, prevention, detection and intervention that will ensure that every American has the potential to lead a hearing life.

• Working with the campaign, I am pleased to announce the recent formation of the first-ever Congressional Hearing Health Caucus. The caucus is a bipartisan group of congressional Members committed to the study and support of hearing health issues. Caucus co-chairs include myself, Representatives JIM WALSH, CAROLYN MCCARTHY, and JIM RYUN, who knows first-hand the impact of hearing loss. We are greatly interested in these vital issues that affect so many Americans' health and well-being.

• While the increase in the availability of newborn hearing tests represents tremendous progress--we all realize that screening is just the first step. We must begin to look to the future and prepare for the time when 100 percent of newborns are screened at birth. We must ensure that, once a baby's hearing loss is detected, all parents have access to the appropriate interventions--be they digital hearing aids or cochlear implants--regardless of their economic status.

• Block grant funding provided to the states through last spring's Walsh bill--also known as the ``Newborn Infant Hearing Screening and Intervention Act'' is also expected to be a catalyst to advance newborn screening and intervention programs through the states. But it too is only a beginning.

• Once a baby's hearing impairment is identified, early intervention with either hearing aids or a cochlear implant is critical. Somewhere between 6 and 24 months, a ``hearing impaired child'' brain starts to shut down that part that processes speech and language. Every hour, two babies in America suffer irreversible damage to their brain's ability to process speech and language. Every hour, two babies cross that 24 month critical window without the hearing assistance they need.

• The issue of funding is one that must be addressed. Today, the campaign is releasing its Medicaid Reimbursement State Report Card--to examine state-by-state the levels of reimbursement provided to low-income families for cochlear implants--one of the new technologies available for hearing impaired children and adults.

  [Page: E2179]  GPO's PDF

• While Medicaid, a joint federal and state program designed to provide medical coverage for low-income families, does cover cochlear implants for eligible children in virtually all states reimbursement levels vary widely from state to state.

• These figures are troubling, especially since studies have shown that cochlear implants provide significant overall savings over the course of a lifetime in comparison to special education costs. It is clear that we have reached a point where our technology has outpaced our policy--leaving us with a situation that is clearly unacceptable--too many children denied life-altering hearing assistive technology due to lack of income or inadequate funding.

• And the problem does not exist under the Medicaid system alone. Private insurance reimbursement for cochlear implants has been found to be even more limited than Medicaid, despite the clear benefits of this technology. As precedent has shown, changes in Medicaid and Medicare can lead to changes in private insurance coverage as well. It is our hope that this data will lead to greater awareness of reimbursement discrepancies in Medicaid policy and will encourage changes that will in turn lead to changes in private insurance reimbursement policy.

• With thousands of potential implant candidates born each year in the United States, we simply cannot afford to ignore this issue any longer. All children in America should have access to this miracle of technology, regardless of their income, socio-economic status or place or residence. By improving Medicaid reimbursement for children, we can ensure that the most vulnerable in this country--low-income children--can have the world of sound open to them.
  

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