Honorable Robert Bunda

President of the Senate

Twenty-Second State Legislature

Regular Session of 2004

State of Hawaii

Sir:

Your Committee on Health, to which was referred S.C.R. No. 77 entitled:

begs leave to report as follows:

The purpose of this measure is to request that the Governor declare 2004 as the "Year of Polio Awareness" in Hawaii.

Testimony in support of this measure was received from the March of Dimes, Hawaii Post Polio Network, and four individuals.

Your Committee finds that the success of the polio vaccine has resulted in complacency among the general public and caused people to forget the 1.6 million polio survivors in the United States who were born before the vaccine was developed. Furthermore, as many as fifty percent of American children are believed not to have received adequate doses of the polio vaccine, and that the polio vaccination rates in Hawaii in 2003 were below the national average. Adoption of this measure will help bring attention to this serious, and often overlooked, physical disability, and encourage vaccination and education of the community.

Your Committee has amended this measure by:

As affirmed by the record of votes of the members of your Committee on Health that is attached to this report, your Committee concurs with the intent and purpose of S.C.R. No. 77, as amended herein, and recommends its adoption in the form attached hereto as S.C.R. No. 77, S.D. 1.