Darlene Hooley: “last month the Democratic Congress showed the commitment to expanding health care coverage to millions of children who…”

“last month the Democratic Congress showed the commitment to expanding health care coverage to millions of children who are currently uninsured. In our budget for the upcoming fiscal year, we included a $50 billion funding increase for the SCHIP program so that we can provide health to millions of additional children. After SCHIP was created 10 years ago, the number of uninsured children began to fall every year. But last year, for the first time since 1998, the number of uninsured actually went up. As we recognize Cover the Uninsured Week, it is important to highlight the growing number of families without access to affordable health insurance and the need for this Congress to strengthen SCHIP now. For 6 long years, this problem of the growing number of uninsured has been ignored. This new Democratic Congress will not ignore the problem. We are committed to expanding health insurance to millions of children who need insurance, and our budget gives us the opportunity to achieve this worthy goal this year.”