The BIRD Health Act establishes a bilateral research and innovation program between the United States and Israel focused on developing and commercializing healthcare technologies. The program will be administered by the Binational Industrial Research and Development Foundation (BIRD Foundation), which has successfully managed similar U.S.-Israel collaborations in energy, cyber, and homeland security since 1977. The initiative will support joint projects in areas including medical devices, pharmaceuticals, genomics, telemedicine, artificial intelligence applications, vaccine development, and biological product manufacturing, with joint governance between the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and Israel's Ministry of Health. The bill authorizes $10 million annually from fiscal year 2026 through 2032, with the program framework to be established within 180 days of enactment and project funding to begin within one year. Congress will receive annual reports on the program's progress and a comprehensive review every three years.
Take Action
Your position
Add a comment
to comment on this bill.
Annotate the text
Highlight any passage on the Summary or Full Text tab to attach a note. Annotations appear on the Annotations tab.