House Speaker Paul Ryan asked Democrats Wednedsay to put aside politics and put health first by approving the GOP’s bill to fund efforts to fight the Zika virus.
“We shouldn’t be politicizing the Zika threat. We should be fighting it,” the Wisconsin Republican wrote in an op-ed for USA Today, citing efforts made by the Republican-led Congress in February to jumpstart the effort to battle the virus.
Ryan said the Obama administration has yet to spend the “hundreds of millions of dollars” of funds authorized for the Zika fight, but that Republicans nonetheless moved “to make sure additional resources are in place if needed.” But after the House approved a $1.1 billion plan, Senate Democrats “derailed it.”
Democrats complained at the time about Republican amendments on contraception and Obamacare, but Ryan chalked it up to politics.
“This was despite months of calling for action, and even voting in favor of that exact funding level just weeks prior. They blocked our plan not once, but twice — a blatant ploy in an election year,” Ryan wrote. “Because of their actions, this funding is in limbo. It shouldn’t be.”
In the meantime, the White House “turns a blind eye to all this,” Ryan wrote, saying it “demands more funding while sitting on unspent funds.”
“It calls for more aggressive mosquito control while Senate Democrats block that authority. It points fingers at Republicans, knowing full well that Senate Democrats are being obstructionist,” Ryan lamented.
Democrats need to “drop politics and put the public’s health first,” Ryan concluded.
Earlier this week, the Obama administration said key federal programs working to find a vaccine against the Zika virus will run out of money this month if Congress doesn’t authorize new spending. Congress is on recess until after Labor Day.
There are now at least 15 cases of Zika in Florida, contracted from mosquitoes locally.
