A top Republican on the House committee overseeing the Department of Veterans Affairs is spearheading bipartisan legislation that would require the agency to pilot the use of a cloud-based system to better manage the supply chain of its medical devices.
The measure was introduced on Monday by Rep. Jen Kiggans, R-Va. — the chair of the House Veterans’ Affairs Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee — and is co-sponsored by Rep. Jimmy Panetta, D-Calif.
The bill would direct the VA secretary to purchase or develop a cloud-based IT management system and then pilot the program at one medical facility before potentially expanding it across the Veterans Health Administration’s entire operations. VA would have three years from the bill’s enactment to complete implementation of the pilot system, and would be allocated $50 million to conduct the effort.
In a one-pager describing the bill, the lawmakers said that “millions of dollars in medical equipment have gone missing from VA facilities across the country in recent years,” including approximately $5 million in medical devices that vanished from VA medical facilities in Florida between 2014 and 2019.
A December 2023 report from the agency’s Office of Inspector General — which the lawmakers also referenced — found that the inventory management system software at VA’s Denver Logistics Center had “access and security vulnerabilities and lacked transparency.” The center manages millions of medical devices, in addition to storing, ordering and shipping supplies to VA facilities.
“By setting a new standard for managing medical supplies and treatment equipment, this bill will help VA staff deliver timely care with the right tools — while also cutting down on waste, delays, and duplicated purchases,” Kiggans said in a statement.
The bill’s introduction comes as the Trump administration has placed a priority on rooting out perceived waste across government, with the Elon Musk-helmed Department of Government Efficiency focused on cutting federal spending. The VA — with the input of DOGE — has similarly undertaken an at times controversial effort to cut staff and contracts across its operations as part of this effort.
