Sec. 2. Findings

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Congress makes the following findings: The United States-Mexico border is an interdependent and dynamic region of more than 15,000,000 people with significant and unique public health challenges. These challenges include low rates of health insurance coverage, poor access to health care services, high unemployment rates, low educational attainment, and high rates of dangerous diseases, such as tuberculosis, diabetes, obesity, and other non-communicable diseases. As the 2009 novel influenza A

(H1N1)pandemic illustrated, diseases do not respect international boundaries, and a strong public health effort at and along the borders is crucial to not only protect and improve the health of Americans but also to help secure the country against threats to biosecurity and other emerging threats. For 11 years, the United States-Mexico Border Health Commission has served as a crucial binational institution to address these unique and truly cross-border health issues. More than 75 percent of Canadians live within 100 miles of the United States border. The 2003 epidemic of severe acute respiratory syndrome caused more than 250 illnesses in the Greater Toronto Area, just 80 miles from New York.