Sherrod Brown: “I rise in support of the Johnson amendment. Mr. Chairman, I commend the gentlewoman for her work and also the…”

“I rise in support of the Johnson amendment. Mr. Chairman, I commend the gentlewoman for her work and also the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lee) and others that have spoken before me. Before I introduced this legislation 2 rac{1}{2} years ago, I visited the Akron Children's Hospital in Akron, Ohio, and saw the outstanding kind of work that medical personnel in that hospital did in pediatric medical advancement. As has been outlined by previous speakers, there is not a very good funding stream for medical education in children's hospitals and especially in freestanding children's hospitals. Ohio is the home, I believe, of more freestanding children's hospitals than any State in the country. With the squeeze of managed care, coupled with the peculiarity of the way that we fund Graduate Medical Education through Medicare, children's hospitals simply cannot produce the pediatric specialists or, for that matter, the pediatric general practitioners that this country needs to produce. This is a very good amendment. This is a very important part of this bill. I commend the sponsor of the bill and ask for support of the Johnson amendment.”