Subcommittee Approves HHS Appropriations Bill

The House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, HHS, Education and Related Agencies on Wednesday voted 9-7 along party lines to approve the fiscal year 2007 Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill, CQ Today reports (Schuler, CQ Today, 6/7). The legislation would provide $141.9 billion in discretionary funds for FY 2007, a 0.6% increase from FY 2006 and $4.1 billion more than President Bush requested but $3.1 billion less than the amount House Republican leaders promised moderates.

Under the bill, the NIH budget would remain at $28.3 billion in FY 2007. The legislation also would increase funds for community health centers and immunizations for children in FY 2007 (Cohn, CongressDaily, 6/7).

Subcommittee Chair Ralph Regula (R-Ohio) said, "We obviously didn't have all the money we'd like to have had."

Subcommittee ranking member David Obey (D-Wis.) said that NIH could lose hundreds of research grants because of a lack of funds. Obey added that the NIH budget would decrease by 3.7% in FY 2007 after adjustment for inflation (CQ Today, 6/7).