Author of Newborn Hearing Screening Legislation to Retire

Rep. Jim Walsh (R-NY), a champion of newborn hearing screening and strong supporter of NIDCD’s mission, announced that he will be retiring from Congress at the end of his term in January 2009 after 20 years in the House of Representatives. Rep. Walsh authored and shepherded through Congress legislation creating the federal government's Early Hearing Detection and Intervention (EHDI) program within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. This legislation was passed in 1999.

When Walsh began working on this issue, only about three percent of U.S. babies were being screened at birth, and fewer than a dozen universal newborn hearing screening programs were in existence. Today, 93 percent of all infants in America are screened within one month of birth, and EHDI programs have been established in every state.

In 2001, Walsh was a founding co-chair of the Congressional Hearing Health Caucus, a bipartisan effort dedicated to hearing health issues, and he has remained the group's co-chair. 

Read Rep. Walsh’s retirement announcement.

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