Political Quotes

“This week the House passed legislation to reauthorize the Children's Hospital Graduate Medical Education program. While a celebration should be in order, I am disappointed the bill was considered on suspension, preventing amendments to improve the program. The bill passed by this Chamber fails to correct a glaring mental health parity issue, which prevents the inclusion of children's psychiatric teaching hospitals in this program. Because these hospitals are classified by Medicare as psychiatric hospitals rather than as children's hospitals, they are ineligible for entry into the program. In order to fix this oversight and to address the acute need for additional health care providers trained in child psychiatry, I introduced legislation, H.R. 2558, the Children's Hospitals Education Equity Act, which would include certain children's psychiatric hospitals in the definition to determine eligibility. I look forward to working with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to correct this inequity and to advance our Nation another step closer to achieving full mental health parity. Gregory K. Fritz: Parity for Kids' Mental Health [From the Providence Journal, Aug. 30, 2011] (By Gregory K. Fritz) Despite the passage of the federal mental-health parity bill, stigma and prejudice are still alive and well when it comes to legislation affecting children's psychiatric hospitals.…”