Dan Coats: “I rise to highlight my particular support for one provision in the committee report for this bill and express my concern…”

“I rise to highlight my particular support for one provision in the committee report for this bill and express my concern with proposed Food and Drug Administration rulemaking that would adversely effect asthma patients. First, I'd like to note my own personal interest in the issue. My own children suffer from asthma and I appreciate only too well the impact of this condition on children and their families. As a result, I strongly support efforts to ensure that asthmatics have access to the safest and most effective treatment. The agency's recent actions, however, suggest that remote, even hypothetical environmental concerns might take precedence over the direct concerns for the lives and health of America's substantial asthmatic population. In March of this year, the agency issued an advance notice of proposed rulemaking setting forth the criteria by which it would ban certain CFC-propelled metered-dose inhalers [MDI's] from sale in this country. The proposal was apparently developed in response to concerns about ozone depletion.”