Legislation would ensure proper-fitted body armor for female service members

Bipartisan legislation recently introduced in the Senate would ensure body armor and personal protective equipment (PPE) is properly-fitted and readily available for female service members.

Access to smaller sized PPE and female-specific PPE is severely limited and issued to only some women who are deploying, according to the Defense Advisory Committee on Women in the Services.

The Female Body Armor Modernization Act of 2019 would encourage armed services to expedite the contracting, procuring, and fielding of new generation PPE that better fits and protects all service members; and would encourage collaboration with academia and industry to develop the next generation of combat equipment and PPE.

The act also would require the armed services to submit a report to Congress in the fiscal year 2021 concerning any barriers that they have encountered procuring the latest versions of PPEs.

The Defense Health Agency would be required to begin administering a trackable system for data related to injuries related to the issuance of new PPE and to report to Congress the prevalence of preventable injuries attributed to ill-fitting or malfunctioning PPE in fiscal year 2025.

Finally, the act would require the Department of Defense to include questions in the annual Periodic Health Assessment on whether service members were injured by ill-fitting or malfunctioning PPE.