Today, the House of Representatives voted to approve a legislative package for fiscal year 2024 spending, which includes $22 million in funding for lupus research and education programs! We are thrilled to announce that the spending package introduced includes:

• $10 million for the National Lupus Patient Registry at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), bringing total funding for the program to more than $111 million since its creation in 2003 - funding that is helping to reduce the time it takes to diagnose the disease and to provide tools and resources that can help people with lupus manage their care and improve their quality of life.  
• $10 million for the Lupus Research Program at the Department of Defense (DOD) for the fifth consecutive year, bringing total funding to $86 million for the program, which supports innovative lupus research projects across the country that advance our understanding of lupus and improve outcomes.    
• $2 million for the National Lupus Training, Outreach, and Clinical Trial Education Program at the Office of Minority Health (OMH), a vital program to increase minority participation in clinical trials, which is urgently needed to advance the development of new treatments for lupus.

Next Steps

The House passed the bill, clearing the way for it to be voted in the Senate and signed into law by the president before current government funding expires at 11:59 pm tonight, with a possible short extension needed over the weekend. 

When this package is signed into law by the president, in the last five years alone, lupus advocates will have generated more than $103 million in federal funding for lupus-specific programs that are increasing our understanding of lupus and accelerating the search for new treatments for it.

Lupus advocates continue to be successful in demonstrating the need for federal funding for lupus research and education programs by telling their stories to elected officials and making the case for investing in the fight against lupus.

In addition to our network of lupus advocates, we are also grateful for the Congressional Lupus Caucus  leading the fight against lupus on Capitol Hill, and especially co-chairs Representative Andrew Garbarino of New York and Representative Bill Keating of Massachusetts.

Help Write the Next Success Story

To lend your voice and your story to our advocacy efforts to secure future government funding and much more, join us at the 2024 National Lupus Advocacy Summit in Washington, DC this May!