WASHINGTON (LifeSiteNews) – The Senate is considering a bill that would green-light hundreds of millions of funding for government vaccination databases, which medical freedom advocates are warning would lead to a “monumental invasion” of civil liberties.
The Immunization Infrastructure Modernization Act (IIMA), or HR 550, sets aside more than $400 million to expand data systems used by public health departments to collect information about Americans’ vaccination history.
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The bill would also promote the exchange of vaccination data between state and local agencies and the federal government and would require government entities to adopt data standards set by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as a condition of funding.
New Hampshire Democrat Rep. Annie Kuster, who authored HR 550, noted in a statement that her legislation could be used to “remind patients when they are due for a recommended vaccine and identify areas with low vaccination rates.” HR 550 would boost funding to vaccine providers while enhancing “real-time” reporting of vaccination data, she boasted.
“What this bill would create is more access for CDC for your immunization data, and the need for states to follow CDC recommendations or get cut off from federal funding,” medical freedom group Stand for Health Freedom warned.
“This bill has everything to do with mandates and digital health passes,” the group added. “It is the legal infrastructure, so to speak, for the digital infrastructure.”
“H.R. 550 it would lead to a monumental invasion of our rights as American citizens,” Children’s Health Defense said. “It would set a dangerous precedent and could lead to more vaccine mandates, and more restrictions of services and healthcare for the unvaccinated.”
Despite the bill’s price tag and implications for privacy rights, it nevertheless cleared the House last week with significant GOP support.
Eighty Republicans joined all present Democrats to send HR 550 to the Senate in a 294-130 vote Tuesday, LifeSiteNews reported. Republicans who backed the bill include House Minority Leader Rep. Kevin McCarthy, Rep. Dan Crenshaw of Texas, Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming, and four who signed on as co-sponsors. A vote has not yet been scheduled in the Senate.
“Based on a reading of the bill, and a knowledge of the history of the federal efforts for an immunization infrastructure, the Republicans who voted yes on this bill are either recklessly uninformed, or knew exactly what they were doing and are now selling the public an Orwellian bill of goods,” Stand for Health Freedom said. “Neither is good.”
CONTACT SENATORS: Tell them to OPPOSE vaccination registries! Click to contact your Senators, now.
One hundred thirty House Republicans opposed HR 550, including Rep. Mary Miller of Illinois, who told Breitbart that the legislation is “clearly a legislative tool to enforce vaccine mandates” and “Orwellian rules” for the unvaccinated.
“This bill would allow the government to collect, study, and share your private health data. There are endless ways the government could potentially use that information against you,” she said.
“This legislation would unnecessarily appropriate millions of taxpayer funds intended to expand bureaucracy in Washington,” Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida concurred. “A database solely created to record and collect confidential vaccination information of Americans explicitly encroaches upon individuals’ fundamental right to medical privacy.”
It’s not clear whether HR 550 will have enough votes to make it out of the evenly-split Senate. Every Republican senator sponsored a resolution that passed Wednesday to repeal the Biden’s vaccine mandate for private businesses. Two Democrats, Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Jon Tester of Montana, supported the measure.
Senate Republicans had backed another amendment last week authored by Republican Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas and Sen. Mike Lee of Utah to block funding and enforcement of each of Biden’s vaccine mandates, though it failed without any Democratic support.