“Recently I was in Houston, Texas with some of my friends from the Harris County Public Health District, and they were demonstrating to me how they trap mosquitoes”.
Advertisement
Tim Kaine (D-VA) failed to show up to vote for Zika funding in the Senate, after calling for Republican leadership to end the Congressional recess early in order to vote on new Zika legislation.
The political gridlock comes after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that it had spent almost all of the $22m (£16m) allocated to the agency in the fight against Zika.
“To have a public health emergency that takes its biggest toll on children challenges our conscience in a very different way”, Pelosi said.
“I’m still stunned that the Republican leader made a decision to have a seven-week vacation, and it was more important to do that than funding our nation’s Zika response”, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said.
“It’s hard to explain why, despite their own calls for funding, Democrats would block plans to keep women and babies safe from Zika”, Mr. McConnell said before the vote. She lives in Miami, where the Zika virus is spreading and the Republicans who run Congress refuse to respond without cutting off funds for Planned Parenthood.
Lawmakers returning to Washington after a seven-week break picked up right where they left off – feuding about legislation to battle the mosquito-borne Zika virus and deadlocked over the defense budget.
There have been 2,700 cases of the virus in the US, according to the Center for Disease Control. Currently, the Centers for Disease Control reports at least 624 pregnant women have been infected with Zika in the U.S. Five of their unborn babies died in miscarriages or abortions, while 16 other babies were born with birth defects in the U.S., the CDC reports. Typically, extending that time is done with little fanfare or notice.
“We need a bipartisan agreement”, Sylvia Burwell, the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services, said in a briefing last week.
This time pressure has many, including Sen.
Blunt, in May, told reporters that a US response has not been negatively impacted by the time it took to reach a deal because federal agencies had been cleared to spend Ebola funds on Zika.
Advertisement
Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, R-Texas, said Tuesday that he thinks it would make sense to combine the budget and Zika talks. We did not know.
