Please contact your members of Congress and ask them to include health care professional student loan forgiveness in any of the pending health care reform packages at ASHA's Take Action Web site.

A modified version of the Access to Frontline Health Care Act of 2009 has been included in the U.S. House of Representative's health care reform package (Section 340 H. of H.R. 3200). As originally written and introduced (H.R. 2891), the Frontline Act would create a new loan repayment program for health care providers pledging to work in areas designated to have a health professional shortage.

However, upon inclusion in H.R. 3200, the language was amended to direct 90 percent of the funding for primary care physicians, leaving less to speech-language pathologists and audiologists. Furthermore, the Senate has yet to include similar language in its committees' versions of health care reform.

Please send a letter to your U.S. Representative and U.S. Senators asking for equity for allied health providers in the H.R. 3200 and inclusion in any future Senate health care reform bills. For further information, please contact Stefanie Reeves, ASHA's Director for Political Advocacy, at sreeves@asha.org.