Health committee advances multiple bills, refers several to appropriations; psilocybin, palliative care and cooperative-agreement measures move forward
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Summary
The House Health and Human Services Committee reported a slate of bills including HB 267, HB 815, HB 41, HB 300 (substitute), a block of uncontested public-health measures, HB 435 on palliative-care regulations, and HB 13 47 on psilocybin regulation; some items were referred to appropriations or carried over.
At its full committee meeting, the House Committee on Health and Human Services considered and voted on a range of health-related bills and procedural items.
Early in the session the committee reported a substitute for HB 267 and referred the bill to appropriations by voice/roll vote (reported 20 to 0). HB 815 was reported by a vote of 20 to 0. HB 41, which carried amendments, was reported by a closer vote of 11 to 8.
The committee then took up a block of uncontested subcommittee bills. After Delegate Griffin asked to pull HB 300 from that block, the remaining block (HB 756, HB 1336, HB 1353) was reported 19 to 0. The pulled bill, HB 300, which would set cooperative agreements approved under the Southwest Virginia Health Authority to expire 10 years after initial approval and require the Virginia Department of Health to transfer related records to the attorney general within 60 days, was later reported with substitute by a vote of 18 to 1.
Other committee actions included carrying HB 81 over to 2027 under Rule 22 and reporting HB 435 with substitute (which directs the board of health to require a palliative-care identification system and to establish an educational program) and referring it to appropriations; the committee recorded the HB 435 report with substitute as 18 to 2. Delegate Elliot Cohen’s HB 13 47, which would allow the Board of Pharmacy to promulgate regulations permitting prescribing, dispensing, possession and use of any FDA-approved formulations of psilocybin following DEA rescheduling, was reported by a vote of 20 to 0.
Committee members asked procedural and substantive questions at several points, and multiple bills were referred for further fiscal or appropriations review where a fiscal impact statement (FISC) was flagged. The committee adjourned after completing its agenda and moving the cited bills to the next steps in the legislative process.
