U.S. Senator Deb Fischer
Many of us have heard the sobering facts about China’s growing military might. Beyond its rapidly advancing military, China is also becoming increasingly aggressive in the Indo-Pacific region. In the South China Sea, for example, Chinese military ships continue to harass Filipino vessels to bully the Philippines into submission; and in the Taiwan Strait, China regularly sends military aircraft to intimidate Taiwan.
At some point, China could miscalculate and provoke an all-out war or intentionally initiate military action, potentially drawing the United States into a conflict. A war against a technologically advanced adversary like China would almost certainly result in massive numbers of casualties, unlike anything we’ve seen this century. If deterrence fails, we cannot be caught unprepared, and we must have plans to quickly transport and treat injured servicemembers.
Today, the Military Health System is not prepared to respond to casualties resulting from conflict against a military power such as China. It’s something we must address now—both to fulfill our sacred obligation to those who risk their lives for our country and because our adversaries are becoming increasingly aggressive.
This includes modernizing the National Disaster Medical System (NDMS), which would be called upon to plan, coordinate, and execute our medical response to a mass casualty event like a war. The NDMS is comprised of multiple federal agencies that partner with civilian health care organizations to create a network to care for civilian or military casualties in crises. For this reason, for the past several years I have authorized and funded a pilot program to improve the NDMS, making it easier for different entities to work together and expanding NDMS’s surge capacity to care for more patients.
Last week, during a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, I questioned experts on how we can continue to strengthen NDMS and prepare our nation for an attack that could quickly overwhelm our health system. At the hearing, the experts urged Congress to find a way to take the lessons learned from the pilot program and apply them going forward.
The experts also underscored the importance of the military partnering with civilian entities such as academic institutions. One institution that works closely with the Military Health System is our own University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC). Specifically, UNMC has a leading program for treating patients with highly contagious infectious diseases and on-site training built in partnership with the U.S. Air Force. Military-civilian partnerships like these strengthen the NDMS, while also improving care for both military and civilian patients, by accelerating the exchange of ideas between institutions that would need to collaborate closely if a major war erupted. These partnerships build up future leaders to specialize in medical areas that are relevant to combat.
We all hope that we will never see war against a major military power, but we must live in reality and recognize the growing aggression and capabilities of our adversaries. I’ll be working with my colleagues on the Senate Armed Services Committee to strengthen our national security, which includes improving our Military Health System.
Thank you for participating in the democratic process. I look forward to visiting with you again next week.