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Read. Follow. Verify.Iowa requires public employers to provide regular cancer screenings for full-time firefighters, police, and EMS staff and updates cancer benefit definitions
Last action · June 11, 2025: Fiscal note.Sponsor: Dan Dawson
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What This Bill Does
Beginning July 1, 2025, public employers in Iowa must provide full-time firefighters, police officers, and emergency medical services providers with health insurance benefits covering cancer screenings every three years without any out-of-pocket costs. The state appropriates $1 million for the starting July 1, 2025, to reimburse local s for these exams up to $1,250 per employee. Additionally, the measure broadens the legal definition of cancer for public safety retirement systems, expanding eligibility for accidental disability and death benefits.
Local governments must fund mandatory cancer screenings for full-time emergency personnel while receiving state reimbursement capped at $1,250 per worker every three years, and public safety workers gain broader access to disability and death benefits tied to cancer diagnoses.
- Public safety workers face statistically higher risks of certain occupational cancers due to repeated exposure to toxic smoke, hazardous materials, and environmental pollutants. context
- Iowa political subdivisions operate local police and fire departments, making them responsible for initial employee health benefit administration before state reimbursement. context
Who It Affects
Groups the bill's text affects, as described in the record. Being affected is not a position for or against it.
fire fighters
Full-time paid firefighters receive mandatory employer-provided cancer screenings every three years without out-of-pocket costs and gain broader access to disability benefits under updated cancer definitions.
police officers
Full-time paid police officers receive mandatory employer-provided cancer screenings every three years without out-of-pocket costs and gain broader access to disability benefits under updated cancer definitions.
emergency medical services providers
Full-time paid EMS providers receive mandatory employer-provided cancer screenings every three years without out-of-pocket costs.
political subdivisions
Local government employers must provide required screenings and maintain records for state reimbursement capped at $1,250 per employee under a mandatory state program.
Key Facts
- Beginning July 1, 2025, public employers must provide health care benefits including a cancer screening examination by a physician to full-time paid firefighters, police officers, and EMS providers within three years of employment and every three years thereafter.
- Covered public safety employees cannot be required to pay a copayment, deductible, coinsurance, or out-of-pocket expense for the cancer screening examination.
- Political subdivisions are eligible for state reimbursement for screening costs, capped at $1,250 per three-year period per eligible employee.
- The state appropriates $1 million from the general fund to the department of management for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2025, and ending June 30, 2026, to reimburse political subdivisions for the screenings.
Show all 8 facts
- The definition of "cancer" in Code chapters 97A and 411 is amended to mean a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body, removing specific cancer lists.
- The redefinition of cancer expands the availability of accidental disability and death benefits to members of the Peace Officers' Retirement, Accident, and Disability System and the 411 municipal retirement system.
- The redefinition of cancer also expands the definition used in Code section 97B.50A for in-service disability retirement allowances under the Iowa Public Employees' Retirement System.
- Code section 25B.2, subsection 3, which would relieve political subdivisions from complying with unfunded state mandates, is made inapplicable to this Act, making compliance mandatory.
Frequently Asked Questions
Which employees are eligible for the mandatory cancer screenings?
How often must the cancer screenings take place?
Will eligible employees have to pay anything out of pocket for the screenings?
How much financial reimbursement can local governments receive from the state?
What else do you want to know?
News Coverage
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Votes, people, money & the original sourceWhere This Stands
Current status: Signed into law.
Procedural history
43 actions- Jun 11, 2025Iowa LegislatureFiscal note.
- Jun 6, 2025HouseEnrolledSigned by Governor . H.J. 1228 .
- May 19, 2025HouseReported correctly enrolled, signed by Speaker and President, and sent to Governor. H.J. 1224 .
- Apr 24, 2025HouseExplanation of vote. H.J. 1070 .
- Apr 22, 2025HouseExplanation of vote. H.J. 1034 .
- Apr 15, 2025HouseMessage from House. S.J. 800 .
Show 37 earlier actions
- Apr 15, 2025HouseImmediate message. H.J. 945 .
- Apr 15, 2025HouseFloorPassed House , yeas 94, nays 0. H.J. 944 .
- Apr 15, 2025HouseFloorHouse concurred in Senate amendment H-1223 . H.J. 943 .
- Apr 15, 2025HouseExplanation of vote. H.J. 945 .
- Apr 10, 2025Iowa LegislatureFiscal note.
- Apr 10, 2025HouseSenate amendment H-1223 filed. H.J. 929 .
- Apr 10, 2025HouseMessage from Senate. H.J. 926 .
- Apr 9, 2025SenateImmediate message. S.J. 745 .
- Apr 9, 2025SenateFloorPassed Senate , yeas 46, nays 1. S.J. 743 .
- Apr 9, 2025SenateFloorAmendment S-3063 adopted. S.J. 743 .
- Apr 2, 2025Iowa LegislaturePlaced on calendar.
- Apr 2, 2025SenateAmendment S-3063 filed. S.J. 682 .
- Apr 2, 2025SenateCommittee report, recommending amendment and passage. S.J. 682 .
- Apr 2, 2025Iowa LegislatureFiscal note.
- Mar 31, 2025Iowa LegislatureSubcommittee recommends amendment and passage.
- Mar 28, 2025Iowa LegislatureSubcommittee Meeting: 03/31/2025 2:30PM Room 217 Conference Room.
- Mar 27, 2025SenateSubcommittee: Webster, Bousselot, and Townsend. S.J. 661 .
- Mar 27, 2025SenateIntroducedRead first time, referred to State Government. S.J. 659 .
- Mar 27, 2025HouseMessage from House. S.J. 659 .
- Mar 26, 2025HouseImmediate message. H.J. 850 .
- Mar 26, 2025HouseFloorPassed House , yeas 96, nays 0. H.J. 819 .
- Mar 26, 2025HouseFloorAmendment H-1191 adopted, as amended. H.J. 819 .
- Mar 26, 2025HouseFloorAmendment H-1202 to amendment H-1191 filed, adopted. H.J. 819 .
- Mar 25, 2025HouseAmendment H-1191 filed. H.J. 815 .
- Mar 25, 2025Iowa LegislatureFiscal note.
- Mar 20, 2025HouseIntroducedIntroduced, placed on calendar. H.J. 753 .
- Mar 20, 2025Iowa LegislatureCommittee report approving bill, renumbered as HF 969 .
- Mar 5, 2025HouseCommittee vote: Yeas, 20. Nays, 0. Excused, 3. H.J. 534 .
- Mar 5, 2025HouseCommittee report, recommending amendment and passage. H.J. 534 .
- Mar 4, 2025Iowa LegislatureSubcommittee recommends passage.
- Mar 3, 2025Iowa LegislatureSubcommittee Meeting: 03/04/2025 12:30PM RM 102.
- Mar 3, 2025Iowa LegislatureSubcommittee recommends amendment and passage.
- Feb 27, 2025HouseSubcommittee: Kaufmann, Turek and Wilz, H. H.J. 464 .
- Feb 27, 2025HouseIntroducedIntroduced, referred to State Government. H.J. 462 .
- Feb 24, 2025SenateSubcommittee Meeting: 02/26/2025 3:30PM Senate Lounge.
- Feb 20, 2025SenateSubcommittee: Webster, Bousselot, and Townsend. S.J. 326 .
- Feb 11, 2025SenateIntroducedIntroduced, referred to State Government. S.J. 241 .
Version history
Only one version on file - nothing to compare yet. As later stages (committee substitute, engrossed, enrolled) are captured, the redline appears here.
View official text →Lobbying Activity
No state lobbying filings in our records match this bill. Federal lobbying reports (LDA) cover Congress, so they are not listed on state bills.
Full breakdown
Who this bill affects and the strongest case for and against it, written only from the bill’s own text.
Sponsors
Discoveries
Patterns POLISCOPE noticed across the record. These are observations to investigate, not conclusions.
Broadening Public Safety Retirement Criteria
The bill shifts retirement system criteria away from enumerated lists of specific cancers to a broad definition of abnormal cell growth, expanding accidental disability and death benefit availability.
Connected Entities
Sources
www.legis.iowa.gov
Analysis Score
0–100- Significance75How much this matters to a regular citizen
- Controversy20Intensity of disagreement among stakeholders
- Entertainment5Compellingness for a non-policy-wonk reader
- Buzz40Current news / social attention level
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