Section 1 Silvio O. Conte Senior Biomedical Research Service
Hiring and retention authority— Section 228 of the Public Health Service Act (42 U.S.C. 237) is amended—
in the section heading, by inserting “and Biomedical Product Assessment” after “Research”;
in subsection (a)(1), by striking “Silvio O. Conte Senior Biomedical Research Service, not to exceed 500 members” and inserting “Silvio O. Conte Senior Biomedical Research and Biomedical Product Assessment Service (in this section referred to as the “Service”), the purpose of which is to recruit and retain competitive and qualified scientific and technical experts outstanding in the field of biomedical research, clinical research evaluation, and biomedical product assessment”;
by amending subsection (a)(2) to read as follows:
“(2) The authority established in paragraph (1) may not be construed to require the Secretary to reduce the number of employees serving under any other employment system in order to offset the number of members serving in the Service.”
in subsection (b)—
in the matter preceding paragraph (1), by striking “or clinical research evaluation” and inserting “, clinical research evaluation or biomedical product assessment” after “evaluation”; and
in paragraph (1), by inserting “or a master's level degree in engineering, bioinformatics, or a related or emerging field,” after the comma;
in subsection (d), by striking “and shall not exceed the rate payable for level I of the Executive Schedule unless approved by the President under section 5377(d)(2) of title 5, United States Code” and inserting “and shall not exceed the rate payable for the President”;
by striking subsection (e); and
by redesignating subsections (f) and (g) as subsections (e) and (f), respectively.
Report— Not later than 3 years after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Health and Human Services shall submit, and publish on the website of the Department of Health and Human Services a report on the implementation of the amendments made by subsection (a), including whether the amendments have improved the ability of the Food and Drug Administration to hire and retain qualified experts to fulfill obligations specified under user fee agreements.