Advocacy - Comment Letter
Dear Representative Morrison:
The Association for Diagnostics & Laboratory Medicine (ADLM) endorses your legislation, H.R.4709, the “Newborn Screening Saves Lives Reauthorization Act,” which would preserve advances in state newborn screening programs. When the initial law was enacted in 2008, only 10 states and the District of Columbia screened for 29 treatable core conditions. Now all jurisdictions test for 30 of 35 recommended core conditions. H.R.4709 would preserve and expand these gains.
As a result of greater federal involvement in newborn screening, more than four million babies are screened for these conditions. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) this early screening results in more than 12,000 newborns receiving life-saving treatments and interventions annually.
In addition to expanding access to newborn screening, H.R. 4709 would:
- allow state screening programs to better assess and coordinate newborn treatments;
- continue research towards identifying treatments for conditions that can be detected through early testing;
- ensure the quality of testing provided by newborn screening laboratories; and
- renew the Advisory Committee on Heritably Disorders in Newborns and Children.
ADLM is pleased to support this important legislation once more. We offer our assistance in gaining its passage.
ADLM is a global scientific and medical professional organization dedicated to clinical laboratory science and its application to healthcare. ADLM brings together clinical laboratory professionals, physicians, research scientists, and business leaders from around the world focused on clinical chemistry, molecular diagnostics, mass spectrometry, translational medicine, lab management, and other areas of clinical laboratory science to advance healthcare collaboration, knowledge, expertise, and innovation.
If you have any questions, please email Vince Stine, PhD, ADLM’s Senior Director of Government and Global Affairs, at [email protected], or Evan Fortman, MPA, ADLM’s Manager of Government Affairs at [email protected].
Sincerely,
Paul J. Jannetto, Ph.D., DABCC, FAACC
President, ADLM