Stakeholders urge House committee to advance SOAR Act
By HME News Staff
Updated 10:08 AM CDT, Thu July 2, 2026
WASHINGTON – AAHomecare, the Council for Quality Respiratory Care (CQRC) and the VGM Group are urging leaders of the House Energy & Commerce Committee to take up and pass the Supplemental Oxygen Access Reform Act (SOAR Act) before the August recess. In a June 30 letter to Chair Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., and Ranking Member Frank Pallone, D-N.J., the organizations said H.R. 2902 should move independently from other pending DME-related legislation to avoid slowing its progress. “The issues it addresses are urgent and consequential,” they wrote. “Beneficiaries need access to liquid oxygen. The entire system needs stability to allow for innovation. Current CMS authority cannot solve this problem.” The SOAR Act, sponsored in the House by Reps. David Valadao, R-Calif., Julia Brownley, D-Calif., and Adrian Smith, R-Neb., has more than 60 bipartisan co-sponsors. Companion legislation in the Senate, S. 1406, has been introduced by Sens. Bill Cassidy, R-La., Mark Warner, D-Va., and Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn. The organizations say the bill would support access to supplemental oxygen for more than 1.5 million people with chronic lung and heart diseases, but they warned that CMS would still need two to three years to implement changes once new authority is enacted. They also highlighted provisions related to liquid oxygen, state-determined respiratory therapy services and electronic clinical data elements intended to reduce improper payments. They say a standardized electronic template could prevent about $60 million annually in improper payments for supplemental oxygen based on CMS data.
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