Statement on Signing a Bill Authorizing Insured Loans To Provide Nursing Home Fire Safety Equipment.

S. 513, which I sign into law today, will enable the Federal Government to insure mortgage insurance for fire safety equipment in nursing homes and intermediate care facilities not now eligible for such assistance.

This legislation represents another important step in our efforts to improve the lives of elderly Americans. It builds on our comprehensive program of nursing home reform which was launched in 1971. It also represents a crucial new step in a national effort to enhance our fire protection practice.

Because of their physical dependence, elderly men and women confined to nursing homes and other long-term care facilities are especially threatened by outbreaks of fire. Often this threat can be significantly diminished by modest investments in fire safety equipment. In a recent nursing home fire in Wayne County, Pa., it was found that a $200 smoke-warning device could have saved 7 of the 11 lives that were lost.

A recent study of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare shows that many nursing homes participating in the Medicare or Medicaid program have not met all of the requirements of the Life Safety Code. Automatic sprinklers, for example, have yet to .be installed in a number of homes that have been identified as needing them.

We intend to see that such deficiencies are corrected. But as we enforce the Life Safety Code, we must also assist nursing home owners in raising the capital needed for essential fire safety modifications.

It was to this end that my Administration endorsed 'the enactment of S. 513. But our efforts to improve the Nation's fire safety practices must not stop here.

That is why this Administration has proposed other comprehensive amendments to the National Housing Act which would enable the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development to insure supplemental loans to a broad range of health facilities and multifamily housing units for increased fire protection. Even as I sign S. 513, I urge early and favorable consideration of these additional amendments.