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Democrats in the Senate are asking colleagues to back a resolution expressing the sense that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services should provide "continuous access to timely, up-to-date, and accurate health information."
HHS and its agencies "help health care providers and the public learn about and respond to public health incidents and threats, including outbreaks of infectious diseases," including bird flu, dengue, measles and other diseases, according to the resolution text.
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Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, introduced the pro-health communications resolution together with 10 other Senate Democrats. The resolution is under the jurisdiction of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
Schatz and the cosponsors are responding to reports the administration of President Donald Trump has suspended most public communications from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and from HHS agencies such as the National Institutes of Health, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Related: Trump administration pauses most CDC, HHS and CMS communications
The pause has frozen the ability of the NIH to distribute medical research grants, according to the American Association of Cancer Research.
The pause has also led to the suspension of publication of the CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report and of the FluView Interactive weekly report.
The CDC did post new information about the H5N1 bird flu outbreak Friday.
Some agencies have said the communications pause could last until early February, and some news organizations are reporting that the pause will last until the Senate has confirmed the HHS political appointees who would be in charge of reviewing the activities and communications of the department and its agencies.
The pause comes as health insurers, including companies that provide stop-loss insurance for employers' self-insured health plans, are gathering the data they need to design health coverage for 2026 and establish 2026 group health premiums.
The future: A sense of the Senate resolution simply expresses the view of the Senate. It is not a legally binding action, but it may be an early indication that Congress will take action, according to a Congressional Research Service primer on the topic.
Members of the Senate can adopt a sense of the Senate resolution without help from the House.
Republicans now hold a 53-47 seat edge in the Senate and control the Senate HELP Committee. To move the proposed HHS communications resolution to adoption, supporters would have to persuade some Senate HELP members to cross party lines. Supporters would then have to persuade at least 13 Republicans to cross party lines to overcome the possibility of a filibuster, or endless round of debate, and get the bill onto the Senate floor as an ordinary stand-alone piece of legislation.
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Allison Bell
Allison Bell, a senior reporter at ThinkAdvisor and BenefitsPRO, previously was an associate editor at National Underwriter Life & Health. She has a bachelor's degree in economics from Washington University in St. Louis and a master's degree in journalism from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. She can be reached through X at @Think_Allison.
