S. 2710Senate115th Congress (2017-2019)In Committee

Protecting Moms and Infants Act

AI-Generated Summary

Updated April 15, 2026 at 9:20 PM UTC

The Protecting Moms and Infants Act aims to improve treatment and early‑intervention services for pregnant and postpartum women and their infants who are affected by substance use disorders, especially opioid use. It requires the Health and Human Services Secretary to report on the implementation of existing prenatal opioid strategies and boosts funding for residential treatment programs. The bill also directs federal agencies to develop clinician‑focused educational tools, disseminate strategy recommendations, and foster partnerships that support education and care for this population.

Key Provisions

The HHS Secretary must submit a report within 60 days on how the prenatal opioid use strategy (including neonatal abstinence syndrome) is being implemented, and provide periodic updates thereafter.
Funding for residential treatment programs for pregnant and postpartum women is increased to $29.931 million each year for fiscal years 2019‑2023.
The Center for Substance Abuse Prevention will create educational materials to help clinicians and pregnant women make shared decisions about pain management during pregnancy.
The Center for Substance Abuse Treatment will implement and share the recommendations from the 2017 "Protecting Our Infants Act: Final Strategy" report.
The Center for Substance Abuse Treatment will support public‑private partnerships that educate and assist pregnant women and the health‑care providers who treat them.

Legislative Activity

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1 earlier action

SenateIntro Referral Latest Action

Read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. (text of measure as introduced: CR S2323)

Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee

April 19, 2018

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SenateIntro Referral

Introduced in Senate

April 19, 2018

SenateIntro Referral

Read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. (text of measure as introduced: CR S2323)

Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee

April 19, 2018

Floor Debate

4 members

What members said about S. 2710 on the floor

2 Republicans2 Democrats

Sen. Bill NelsonD-FL · Apr 19, 2018

Mr. President, tomorrow marks another somber occasion. Eight years ago, the news ticker came across our televisions saying that an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, off of Louisiana, was on fire, the…

Mr. President, tomorrow marks another somber occasion. Eight years ago, the news ticker came across our televisions saying that an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico, off of Louisiana, was on fire, the Coast Guard was on the scene, and workers were missing.

It was a Tuesday night. It was nearly midnight on April 20, 2010. By morning light, we knew 11 men would not be going home again. For 87 days, the oil gushed into one of the most productive marine environments in the world. The studies show the oil impacted the deepwater corals and fish at the bottom of the food chain, all the way from the bottom up to the dolphins and sea turtles at the top.

Here is one example. This is one in the bayous. You can see the marsh grasses in the distance. You can see the oil as it is coming up, and it is literally covering everything. They did studies on fish that would be in a bayou like this. A little fish, about as big is this, is called a killifish. LSU professors did this study, and they compared them to the bayous where there was not this kind of oil, compared it to similar killifish. What they found over time was the little fish in bayous like this were stunted. They didn't reproduce. They mutated because of this.

Nearly 5 million barrels of oil gushed for 3 months. A lot of it is still there. Some of it is at the bottom where that well was, and that wellhead on the sea floor below the rig was a mile deep. We worked as one gulf community in a bipartisan way. We passed legislation--it was called the RESTORE Act--to send a message that there were going to be fines and penalties under the Clean Water Act. So many barrels of oil, a figure, and then the culpability of the oil company that allowed it to happen. A Federal judge did an extended trial over several years and came up with that fine and that penalty. The RESTORE Act said that money that was going to be assessed against the oil company was going back to the Gulf of Mexico region, and it was going to aid in the economy and in the environment.

There was another impact. The winds caught that oil slick and started sending it east from Louisiana, and it got over to the white sugary sands of Pensacola Beach in Destin and tar balls as far east as Panama City Beach. Those white sands were completely covered in tar and oil. Those photographs of Pensacola Beach went around the world. What was the result? Our guests, our visitors, our tourists, for an entire season, thought all of the Gulf of Mexico beaches along Florida were covered like Pensacola Beach was, and they didn't come for the entire year. Not only did you have an environmental effect like this, you had an economic effect like the loss of tourist revenue in the hotels, motels, the restaurants, the dry cleaners, the little newspapers, and all the ancillary businesses that depend upon a $60 billion-a-year tourist industry in Florida. Still, I am afraid the oil industry hopes we have forgotten all of this.

This month, the media released documents from 2016 in which BP claims that an oilspill can be a welcomed boost to local economies. Can you believe that? This oilspill was in 2010. In 2016, we have just uncovered documents that BP claimed that an oilspill can be ``a welcome boost to local economies.'' How outrageous and how arrogant. I can assure you, the coastal communities of Florida vigorously disagree, and I bet you the coastal communities that had to put up with that in their bayous would disagree vigorously as well.

All that progress, and yet the industry is relentless in wanting to take us backward. They still want to open up Florida's beaches and offshore to drilling, and we have to fight it every day.

The one thing we also have going for us is, the Gulf of Mexico, off of Florida, is the largest testing and training area for the U.S. military in the world. This Senator just climbed into an Air Force jet to fly part of the training profile for young pilots, knowing they have restricted airspace. That was out of Eglin Air Force Base--the testing and training designee for all of the Department of Defense. We have a range that goes from the Panhandle of Florida all the way south in the Gulf of Mexico, off of Key West. In a one-angle shot, they can shoot sophisticated, long-range weapons 600 miles to do the testing.

Big Oil is now trying to roll back some of the basic safety rules that were put in place after the disaster in order to prevent another tragedy. It is happening in front of our eyes. Two years ago, they said that an oilspill could be a welcome boost to the local economies. Yet they are rolling back safety rules today that were put in place in the aftermath of there being 11 people killed on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig. They are rolling that back today in this administration's agencies.

That is why I am joining Senator Cantwell and other colleagues in introducing legislation to codify these sensible safety measures, like those designed to update the standards for blowout preventers and a requirement for a third party to certify the safety mechanisms.

Let me explain what a blowout preventer is. It didn't work in the Deepwater Horizon oilspill. A mile below the surface, where the well comes out of the Earth, there is a thing called a blowout preventer. If, as happened, there is a blowout in BP's oil well, there is a mechanism that is supposed to safely cut the oil line--pinch it and stop it from flowing. It was faulty. It did not work. So there have been new standards for blowout preventers since 2010. In 2018, 8 years later, the oil industry is trying to roll back those safety requirements that were put in place in the aftermath of their spilling 5 million barrels of oil into the gulf.

Do you see the fight that we have? It is almost every week. We can't allow the Department of the Interior to take us backward in time and expose our beautiful beaches and our tourism-based local economies, as well as our military, to another Deepwater Horizon-type catastrophe if they keep pushing back these safety rules.

That is the purpose of introducing this legislation today with Senator Cantwell. If we don't watch it, we are going to be right back in the same place we were 8 years ago. It will be 8 years ago to the day tomorrow that we had that awful experience.

Sen. Mitch McConnellR-KY · Apr 19, 2018

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Sen. John CornynR-TX · Apr 19, 2018

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Sen. Richard J. DurbinD-IL · Apr 19, 2018

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Sen. Mitch McConnellR-KY · Apr 19, 2018

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the text of the bill be printed in the Record.

Bill Text

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Introduced in SenateIssued April 19, 2018

115th CONGRESS

2d Session

S. 2710

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

April 19, 2018

Mr. McConnell (for himself and Mr. Casey) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions

A BILL

To improve treatment and early interventions for pregnant and postpartum women and infants affected by substance use disorder.

Short title

This Act may be cited as the Protecting Moms and Infants Act.

Improving treatment for pregnant and postpartum women

(a)

Report

(1)

In general

Not later than 60 days after the date of enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Health and Human Services (referred to in this subsection as the Secretary) shall submit to the appropriate committees of Congress and make available to the public on the internet website of the Department of Health and Human Services a report regarding the implementation of the recommendations in the strategy relating to prenatal opioid use, including neonatal abstinence syndrome, developed pursuant to section 2 of the Protecting Our Infants Act of 2015 (Public Law 114–91). Such report shall include—

(A)

an update on the implementation of the recommendations in the strategy, including information regarding the agencies involved in the implementation; and

(B)

information on additional funding or authority the Secretary requires, if any, to implement the strategy, which may include authorities needed to coordinate implementation of such strategy across the Department of Health and Human Services.

(2)

Periodic updates

The Secretary shall periodically update the report under paragraph (1).

(b)

Residential treatment programs for pregnant and postpartum women

Section 508(s) of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 290bb–1(s)) is amended by striking $16,900,000 for each of fiscal years 2017 through 2021 and inserting $29,931,000 for each of fiscal years 2019 through 2023.

Early interventions for pregnant women and infants

(a)

Development of educational materials by Center for Substance Abuse Prevention

Section 515(b) of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 290bb–21(b)) is amended—

(1)

in paragraph (13), by striking and at the end;

(2)

in paragraph (14), by striking the period at the end and inserting ; and; and

(3)

by adding at the end the following:

(15)

in cooperation with relevant stakeholders and the Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, develop educational materials for clinicians to use with pregnant women for shared decisionmaking regarding pain management during pregnancy.

(b)

Guidelines and recommendations by Center for Substance Abuse Treatment

Section 507(b) of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 290bb(b)) is amended—

(1)

in paragraph (13), by striking and at the end;

(2)

in paragraph (14), by striking the period at the end and inserting a semicolon; and

(3)

by adding at the end the following:

(15)

in cooperation with the Secretary, implement and disseminate, as appropriate, the recommendations in the report entitled Protecting Our Infants Act: Final Strategy issued by the Department of Health and Human Services in 2017; and

(c)

Support of partnerships by Center for Substance Abuse Treatment

Section 507(b) of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 290bb(b)), as amended by subsection (b), is further amended by adding at the end the following:

(16)

in cooperation with relevant stakeholders, support public-private partnerships to assist with education about, and support with respect to, substance use disorder for pregnant women and health care providers who treat pregnant women and babies.