Washington, DC- December 23, 2020 – On Monday, December 21, Congress passed FY 2021 appropriations bills, coronavirus relief and authorizations. Congress passed $1.4 trillion for the FY 2021 appropriations omnibus and $900 billion in emergency coronavirus relief. The Labor-HHS-Education bill includes $197 billion in programmatic funding, an increase of $2.8 billion over the 2020 enacted level and $19.2 billion over the president’s 2021 budget request.

Included in the FY 2021 appropriations package:

Department of Health and Human Services is funded at $97 billion, an increase of $2.1 billion above the 2020 enacted level and $9.9 billion above the president’s budget request.

• NIH is funded at $42.9 billion, an increase of $1.25 billion over the 2020 enacted level.
• CDC is funded at $7.9 billion, an increase of $125 million over the 2020 enacted.
• AHRQ is funded at $338 million, level funding from 2020 enacted.

Included in the spending bill are many of SOPHE’s priorities including:

Investments in our nation’s public health infrastructure:

• $201 million for influenza planning and response
• $695 million for public health emergency preparedness cooperative agreements with state and local health departments
• $50 million to support modernization of public health data surveillance and analytics at CDC, state and local health departments
• $56 million for public health workforce and career development
• $12.5 million, the same amount as the 2020 enacted level, for the CDC to specifically support firearm injury and mortality prevention research
• $237.5 million, an increase of $7.5 million, for the CDC to address tobacco and e-cigarettes

The coronavirus relief includes direct payments of up to $600 per adult, $300 per week in unemployment insurance benefits, around $284 billion in Paycheck Protection Program loans, $25 million in rental assistance, an extension on the eviction moratorium and $82 billion for education. It also includes:

HHS received $73 billion to support public health, research, development, manufacturing, procurement, and distribution of vaccines and therapeutics; diagnostic testing and contact tracing; mental health and substance abuse prevention and treatment services; CDC received $8.75 billion to support federal, state, local, territorial and tribal public health agencies to distribute, administer, monitor, and track coronavirus vaccination to ensure broad-based distribution, access, and vaccine coverage. Of that, $300 million for a targeted effort to distribute and administer vaccines to high-risk and underserved populations, including racial and ethnic minority populations and rural communities; NIH received $1.25 billion to support research and clinical trials related to the long-term effects of COVID-19, and continued support for Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics for COVID-19.

The Society for Public Health Education is pleased that Congress could pass a full FY 2021 appropriations package to fund the government and COVID-19 relief to provide necessary help during the pandemic.

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