The House is scheduled to vote Wednesday night on a pair of bills aimed at combating the nationwide baby formula shortage as Democrats scramble to get more supplies on store shelves.
The House voted 414-9 to approve a measure that would allow more formula to be purchased with money from a federal program that aids low-income women, infants and children.
In a more partisan 231-192 vote, the House passed a bill that would send $28 million to the Food and Drug Administration to help boost formula supply and prevent future shortages. Only 12 Republicans voted for that measure.The House action comes just hours after President Joe Biden announced he wasto prioritize key ingredients for formula production and to compel suppliers to provide needed resources to manufacturers. He also launched a program that will use U.S.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro, who chairs the Appropriations Committee and authored the FDA funding bill, said before the vote that most of the money in the legislation would pay for additional FDA employees, including inspectors who could help approve domestic or international formula manufacturing companies. “FDA does not have the adequate inspection force to be able to do that and to do it in a timely way,” DeLauro, D-Conn., said. “So the crux of this is providing infrastructure ... in order to do what needs to get done. And that is about, as quickly as possible, how we get product in and get it on the shelves.”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said he will try to pass the Senate version of DeLauro’s bill this week. “We hope no one will block it. It is such an immediate need,” he said.Rep. Guy Reschenthaler, R-Pa., said on the House floor that the legislation “does nothing — I repeat, nothing — to put more formula on store shelves or hold Biden’s FDA accountable for ignoring this crisis.”
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