Senate Leaders Introduce Bi-Partisan Legislation to Address Veterans Administration Regulations

Member Alert: September 13, 2023 

On September 11, Senators Jon Tester of Montana and Jerry Moran of Kansas, the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, respectively, introduced S.2757: VA Emergency Transportation Access Act, a bill that seeks seeks to address a critical issue that threatens access to ambulance services. The legislation is co-sponsored by Patty Murray of Washington and John Boozman of Arkansas.

Notably, this legislation would protect Veterans' access to emergency ground and air services by requiring the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to perform a thorough study of the impact of any change to reimbursement rates prior to modifying the current rates. This bill comes as the VA and ambulance industry continue to work cooperatively on a solution to the reimbursement issue caused by the Final Rule in February that lowered all air and ground ambulance payments to parity with Medicare. 

The Medicare program reimburses ambulance service organizations far below the cost of providing critical emergency ambulance transportation services. Further reductions will significantly impact the availability of air ambulance transports to Veterans, and dramatically reduce Veterans' access to emergency medical services throughout the United States. 

RESOURCES

• Press Release, Sept 13th: Tester, Moran, Murray, Boozman Introduce Bipartisan Bill to Protect Rural Veterans’ Access to Lifesaving Emergency Medical Transportation

• Review S.2757 Text here.

• An easy, online method to send a letter of support to your Senate representatives
  
  
• AAMS has developed key talking points in collaboration with industry partner organizations. If you would like a copy to have for reference should you receive any inquiries about the bill, please email bbeggan@aams.org.
  
  
• One-pager S.2757 resource document
  
  
• Joint AAMS & ACCT letter of support