Indian Tribes and Tribal organizations can receive public health veterinary services through the Indian Health Service — including spay/neuter, vaccination, and disease surveillance — to prevent zoonotic diseases (illnesses that spread from animals to humans) such as rabies. The Service can deploy veterinary public health officers to tribal service areas and must coordinate with the CDC and the Department of Agriculture. The USDA must complete a study within one year on the feasibility of delivering oral rabies vaccines to wildlife in Arctic regions of the U.S. where rabies poses direct risk to Tribal members. The Indian Health Service is also formally added to the interagency One Health coordination framework used to respond to emerging disease and pandemic threats.
Congressional Summary
Veterinary Services to Improve Public Health in Rural Communities ActThis bill expands support for public health veterinary services (e.g., disease surveillance or vaccination) in tribal communities to address zoonotic infectious diseases (i.e., diseases that spread between humans and animals).Specifically, the bill authorizes the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), acting through the Indian Health Service (IHS), to expend funds for public health veterinary services to prevent and control zoonotic disease infection and transmission in IHS areas where the risk for disease occurrence in humans and wildlife is endemic.HHS may assign or deploy veterinary public health officers from the U.S. Public Health Service (USPHS) Commissioned Corps to IHS areas.Additionally, HHS must submit a biennial report to Congress on the use of funds, the assignment and deployment of veterinary public health officers from the USPHS Commissioned Corps, data related to the monitoring and disease surveillance of zoonotic diseases, and related services.The bill also includes the IHS as a coordinating agency in the National One Health Framework. (This framework addresses zoonotic diseases and advances public health preparedness in the United States.)The bill requires the Department of Agriculture to conduct a feasibility study on the delivery of oral rabies vaccines to wildlife reservoir species that are connected to the transmission of rabies to tribal members living in Arctic regions of the United States. The study must (1) evaluate the efficacy of the oral rabies vaccines, and (2) make recommendations to improve the delivery of these vaccines.
Details
- Congress
- 119th
- Chamber
- House
- Status
- summarized
- Action
- Introduced in House
- Action Date
- 2026-04-23
- Date Added
- 2026-06-08
- Source
- Congress.gov →
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