House and Senate leaders are in "conference" RIGHT NOW debating whether or not employees in the Public Health Service (PHS) will obtain whistleblower protections. At stake is whether or not thousands of PHS employees who work at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will be protected if they blow the whistle on waste, fraud or safety violations.

TAKE ACTION! Tell Congress that PHS employees must have the same protections against retaliation as their colleagues who work at HHS/FDA!

The House-Senate Conference debating the FDA Reform Act (S.3187 / H.R. 5651) will decide the fate of PHS whistleblowers over the next 24-48 hours.

Congress is deciding whether an outrageous loophole in federal law that permits government bureaucrats to fire PHS employee who blow the whistle, will be closed. Currently, there is no protection for PHS whistleblowers. If they report the waste of taxpayer money or "bad science" being used to justify major public health decisions, they can be fired with no recourse!

This weekend whistleblower advocates, with strong support among many Members of Congress, proposed a legislative fix for this unjustifiable and dangerous loophole. The fix would simply provide PHS employees with the same protection all other workers at HHS/FDA have. It gives them the right to lawfully blow the whistle, have an independent investigation conducted by the Office of Special Counsel into any retaliation, and a hearing on the merits of their case. Simple due process.