Earl Pomeroy: “Truly, we have a growing problem relative to the delivery of rural health care, and that is we do not have enough…”

“Truly, we have a growing problem relative to the delivery of rural health care, and that is we do not have enough professionals to deliver the care required. As we look at the pipeline, those coming along compared to those nearing the end of their practice years, we realize that we are working ourselves into a pretty serious problem here and that is especially so when you consider the aging of the population. So I agree with the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers). We need to look at this systemically, why this is happening, and address it. But in the near term, we need to take the step that offers a Band-Aid solution but an important Band-Aid at that, and that is the legislation before us. North Dakota receives about a dozen doctors a year through this important visa waiver provision. Twenty-six cities in the State I represent have participated in this program. We would have a situation where failure to authorize this would create immediate problems in six or seven small towns. They would face the departure of critical medical personnel under the loss of this visa waiver.”