Lyme-fighting legislation being formed in Del. house and senate
Back in July 2014, Delaware lawmakers vowed to confront one of the state’s biggest health threats head on with the creation of the “Delaware Lyme Disease Prevention Task Force”. This past December that task force outlined exactly how they would be addressing the issue. Now, the legislation needed to do so is taking shape.
Speaker of the House, Peter Schwarzkopf, told 47 ABC, “since we started talking about this, you would be stunned how many people have Lyme Disease,”
Two bipartisan pieces of legislation are now taking shape in Dover. The first is the tick mitigation bill in the house. It would give DNREC the green light to handle tick control. Something that right now, doesn’t exist. Through a pest management strategy DNREC would be able to use pesticides and other biological tools to help get a handle on ticks.
“this is strictly enabling legislation and it’s only really effective if we can give them the money to do something about it,” said Schwarzkopf, “if we can stop the transmission from one animal to the next, then maybe we can stop the transmission to humans,
The second bill, in the senate, would create a “Lyme Disease Oversight Board”. A group of seven people appointed by Governor Markell, the Senate Pro Tempore and the Speaker of the House. This board would be in charge of increasing awareness and knowledge amongst the public and health care professionals.
“we want to make sure that all of those individuals, especially those tourists that come and utilize our park system from Cape Henlopen to Seashore State Park are very aware of the fact that if they stray off of those paths, they need to be careful. We want to make sure that signage and education is there,” Said Senator Ernie Lopez.
We’re told both bills are expected to be introduced next week. Lopez tells us now that the legislation is drafted and has received bipartisan support from 23 co-sponsors, he and the rest of the task force are shifting their focus towards what funding may be required. He says he fully expects both bills to be passed by the end of this current session.
Senator Lopez also tells us that the legislative efforts to reduce Lyme in the state won’t stop with those two bills.
In future sessions, we’re told the task force will be focusing on how to better help Lyme patients with paying for care, tests and treatment.
