WASHINGTON — Today, U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), a member of the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, applauded the Senate for invoking cloture on an amendment allocating $1.1 billion in emergency funding to combat the outbreak of Zika. Murphy cosponsored and voted for an amendment that would fully fund President Obama’s $1.9 billion emergency funding request, but the Senate failed to invoke cloture on that amendment. 

“For five months, Senate Republicans have ignored the biggest international health crisis since Ebola. More than 1,200 Americans across nearly every state and territory are battling this terrifying disease, and that number will only grow,” said Murphy. “Mosquito season is right around the corner, which means Zika and its devastating effects are too. We should be funding the president’s full emergency request to stamp out this disease – and we should have done it months ago – but I’m glad that we finally took the first step to confront this health crisis.” 

Murphy has supported numerous initiatives to combat the outbreak of Zika in Connecticut and across the United States, and has continuously called for $1.9 billion of emergency funding to address the outbreak. A bill cosponsored by Murphy – called the Adding Zika Virus to the FDA Priority Review Voucher Program Act – was recently signed into law. It adds Zika as an eligible disease to receive a priority review voucher from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), incentivizing the development of Zika vaccines. 

Forty-four states, the District of Columbia, and several U.S. territories have reported travel-related cases of Zika. There have been no locally acquired reported cases in the continental United States. The Connecticut Department of Public Health has confirmed that six Connecticut residents have tested positive for travel-related cases of Zika. For further information regarding the Zika virus, visit the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s website.