NIOSH Funding Legislation

A potentially harmful legislative measure known as the Barton amendment was defeated in the House of Representatives by a vote of 249-181. All Democrats and 19 Republicans voted against the amendment that would have had a devastating impact on the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) by reducing their budget by more than 20 percent.

Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX) introduced the amendment to restrict the National Institute of Health’s contribution to the Section 241a Public Health Service Evaluation Fund. This fund is the sole source of funding for the NIOSH National Occupation Research Agenda (NORA) – the only federal health research program directed at workplace injuries, diseases and deaths.

The NORA program, which was initiated in 1996, conducts research on several issues of importance to BAC members, including the prevention of injuries and deaths among construction workers, the assessment and reduction of the risk of lung disease from silica exposure, protections for disaster response workers, and the reduction of injuries from work-related violence. Since it is a public-private research program, if federal funding is cut, private contributions will be lost as well.