February 2002 • Volume 8 • Number 2 |
After a 10-month campaign, the Academy claimed victory Dec. 20 when Congress allotted $93 million for primary care training programs in the government's 2002 budget -- a $2 million increase over 2001 funds.
The AAFP had led the fight for the funds since President George W. Bush released his 2002 budget last February. It allotted nothing for these programs. Title VII grants -- specifically those in the primary care and dentistry cluster under Section 747 -- were developed years ago to relieve a physician shortage that no longer exists, said Bush. He called for the funds to be redirected to relieve the nation's nursing shortage and improve diversity among health professions.
"Fighting for funds is something we've done every year," said President Warren Jones, M.D., of Ridgeland, Miss. "But this year, the Bush administration remarked that there's an excess of physicians. We know that's not true when it comes to primary care. So we decided this was something on which we had to take the lead."
The Robert Graham Center in Washington, D.C., developed maps in late spring that showed, across all U.S. counties, what would happen if family physicians weren't available to provide primary care.
"This evidence was very clear," Jones said. "The maps showed a dramatic increase nationwide in underserved counties when family physicians were eliminated. And we need the federal government's money to keep recruiting top medical students into primary care."
Family physicians in the Academy and the Organizations of Academic Family Medicine presented the maps and other evidence to key lawmakers to help convince them to fund the Section 747 programs.
The $93 million appropriated to the primary care and dentistry cluster is less than 25 percent of the $378 million package going to all health professions programs in HHS' annual budget. Last year, the programs were allotted $25 million less.
AHRQ, NHSC, RURAL PROGRAMS GAIN MORE FUNDS
Also within the HHS budget, the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality was appropriated $299 million, an 11 percent increase over 2001 funds. Jones said, "AHRQ supplies research that improves the quality of health care and life for patients. AHRQ and AAFP are on the same page."
The National Health Service Corps is slated to receive $153.5 million -- $11 million more than in 2001. "We have gone to the mat for the NHSC, because we need to help preserve the programs that get young physicians to remote locations and grossly underserved regions," Jones said. "They are doctors who love to practice medicine where it's really needed."
Rural health and telemedicine programs were granted $160 million in the 2002 budget, which is 20 percent more than appropriated in 2001.
2003 BUDGET BATTLE LOOMS
The battle over the 2003 federal budget is expected to be more difficult because of the nation's disappearing budget surplus, said Kevin Burke, director of AAFP's Government Relations Division. At press time, the Bush administration was scheduled to release next year's budget proposal in late January or early this month.
FP Report is published by the
AAFP News Department.
Copyright © 2002 by
American Academy of Family Physicians.