Combating Autism Act (Revised) - Legislation

See Letter to Congress from 38 Organizations Supporting Combating Autism Act Provisions For Vaccine and Environmental Research

On July 18, 2006 A-CHAMP Withdrew Its Endorsement for the Combating Autism Act Because Key Provisions for Environmental, Vaccine & Thimerosal Research Were Removed. Nevertheless, A-CHAMP stands ready at any time to negotiate with any parties to produce legislation that will help our children. See A-CHAMP's announcement below on this page.

To listen to Imus's commentary on the CAA negotiations as of 11/20/06 Click HERE.

A-CHAMP Urges House of Representatives to Retain Designated Environmental Research Funding in Combating Autism Act -

Send a Message Through Our Action Alert By Clicking Here

The Combating Autism Act Passed in the Senate By Unanimous Consent – and without public debate – August 3, 2006, just before 12 midnight. Look for the forthcoming "CAA Watch" or Combating Autism Act Watch – the community's answer to Congress's failure to implement adequate public oversight of autism research.

As of this report it is too early to make a detailed analysis of the bill, the floor colloquy or the Senate report language and how these may shape the legislative history that will determine how the CAA will be implemented. First impression suggests that the legislative history supporting vaccine research is ambiguous, that the public oversight provisions are inadequate in response to the autism community's requests and the lackluster performance of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee, and that the floor colloquy credited inappropriately the IOM findings contained in its May, 2004 report on vaccines and autism. For your review, a pdf file containing the text of the bill as passed by the Senate can be obtained by clicking HERE, A file containing the floor colloquy can be obtained by clicking HERE. A file containing the Senate Report language can be obtained by Clicking HERE. We will provide more information as we learn more.

Interestingly, on the morning after the Senate's action on CAA the Government Accountability Office released a report entitled, "Federal Autism Activities: Funding for Research Has Increased, but Agencies Need to Resolve Surveillance Challenges" based on a year-long study of  autism research and programs requested by Senator William Frist. A cursory review of the report's findings shows that it is critical of government coordination of autism surveillance and the lack of coordination of autism research and programs. It specifically criticized the performance of the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee or IACC, as follows:

However, the IACC services action plan lacks the specificity that would help a state or federal agency to easily implement its recommendations. For example, the plan indicates there is a lack of adequately trained autism providers, but does not specify which types of providers are needed. In addition, although officials from IACC member agencies told us about programs their agencies had under way related to autism, very few of those programs represented coordinated efforts across agencies. Furthermore, agency officials told us that federal coordination is hindered because no federal agency perceives itself as having lead responsibility for addressing the service needs of adults with autism or services for children beyond education. [GAO Autism Research Report, 7/19/06, page 4]

A-CHAMP will be providing further reports and analysis of these issues through our Combating Autism Act Watch Project, at www.caawatch.org, in the near future. The GAO "Federal Autism Activities" Report can be downloaded in pdf format HERE.

Watch for caawatch.org from A-CHAMP, the community's watchdog on government autism programs.
 

A-CHAMP Withdraws Its Endorsement of the Combating Autism Act

(July 18, 2006)

    Last November, A-CHAMP joined with many autism organizations in endorsing a consensus revision of the Combating Autism Act. This revised version of the original bill contained language that directs the NIH to conduct research regarding the environmental causes of autism, specifically the role of any vaccines. The latest version of the bill that will be considered by the Senate substantially deviates, however, from the consensus bill in critical areas. This deviation from the proposed legislation to which we agreed, that removes key provisions from the legislation and contains new provisions that have aroused serious concern, has prompted the withdrawal of the A-CHAMP Board of Directors' endorsement of the proposed legislation. We do, however, continue to support the consensus revision version of the bill. This consensus revision version of the bill has never been introduced in Congress and will not likely be introduced in this session.

    A-CHAMP is an organization founded and operated by parents with the sole focus on our children and others who are similarly situated. We continue to support legislation that will advance the interests of our children. Although the legislation that is now introduced in the Senate falls short of the minimum requirements that merit our support and the support of the community, we are always ready to work with others to enact legislation that will truly address the needs of our children.

Thank you,

The A-CHAMP Board of Directors 

 

 
 

Proposed Revised Combating Autism Act Language
To Be Introduced in Congress*
 

To Take Action Click HERE

*Note: We anticipate that the revised version of the Combating Autism Act will be introduced in Congress in the near future. Unfortunately, as of 4/23/06, this has not yet occurred. We are watching closely to see whether members of Congress will honor their promise to a group of autism organizations that signed a Consensus Statement to introduce the revised text of the bill on which the autism organizations agreed. A-CHAMP supports the revised bill but does not support the original Combating Autism Act, which is the bill that is currently pending in Congress. Please check this page for updates on the status of the Combating Autism Act.

For a list of cosponsors the Combating Autism Act go to the following url's:
For H.R. 2421 House Sponsors:
   http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:HR02421:@@@P

For S. 843 Senate Sponsors:
   http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d109:SN00843:@@@P

Congressional leaders are considering (4/17/06) the introduction of revised language for the Combating Autism Act.  After the introduction of the original bill, S. 843, the text of which you can see by clicking HERE, members of the community, including A-CHAMP, expressed some reservations about the bill, especially because it failed to adequately address the need to allocate resources to research devoted to the role of environmental factors in causing "autism" and neurodevelopmental disorders. Members of the "autism" community worked together to develop a revised bill that would generate support among most segments of the community. A coalition of organizations signed a "Consensus Statement" that you can read HERE. To the credit of all involved the product was the revised bill that you can read HERE. We await the result of negotiations that are occurring in Congress to determine whether the revised version of the bill will be substituted for the original version. A-CHAMP supports the revised Combating Autism Act – we do not support the original version of the bill.

WHY A-CHAMP SUPPORTS THE REVISED COMBATING AUTISM ACT

(S.843 & H.R. 2421)

While the revised bill is not perfect we believe that it now adequately addresses our main concerns. For this reason we support enactment of the revised bill. Because the Combating Autism Act is the best hope to generate significant funding for desperately needed research into the cause and cure of neurodevelopmental disorders, incluing autism, we will advocate vigorously for the bill's enactment. We intend to be a leader in advocating for this bill but that does not mean simply working to obtain legislative votes for the bill. It means educating ourselves and other parents about the research funding process inside and outside the government. It means organizing ourselves to be an effective advocacy community so that once this bill is passed we will be a vigilant voice for the responsible implementation of the Combating Autism Act by the NIH and other government agencies. One of the strengths of the revised bill is the provision for autism community oversight by parents and others. The watchword guiding our vigilance will be ACCOUNTABILITY. We will vigilantly watch our government officials and agents to make sure that their guiding principle will be the welfare of all of our children.

The achievement of consensus among the disparate interests among autism community organizations is a wonderful byproduct of the process by which the revised bill was developed.

 You can read a summary of the revisions contained in the revised bill by clicking HERE.
 

To Take Action on the Revised Combating Autism Act Click Here